


More of Us

by Daisy_Rivers



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe, Established Relationship, Extended Families, F/M, M/M, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Sequel, True Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-08-02
Packaged: 2019-11-28 23:41:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 36,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18215243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daisy_Rivers/pseuds/Daisy_Rivers
Summary: Nearly twenty years have passed since the Second Insurrection ended. Everything seems to be going fine. Then a couple of unexpected guests show up at Gil's fortieth birthday party, threatening the peaceful lives that everyone has been living and throwing them back into the secrecy, intrigue and possible danger of the Insurrections. Everybody has parts of their past that they want to keep concealed. If long silences have to be broken, what might happen not only to Alex and Eliza and John, but to the Republic itself, so recently re-established as a free government?





	1. Telling the Story

**Author's Note:**

> The Mature rating is for things that will happen later. If you haven't read Provoke Outrage, don't worry, you'll catch up by the end of this chapter. If you have, sorry for the tedious identification of everybody and their relationships, but I think we're done with that now.

John and Gil regularly got together for lunch in Baltimore around once a month for what they still referred to as their Trust Fund Babies Club. Most of their charitable work was now administered through the Philip and Catherine Schuyler Foundation, which Eliza directed, but they still found ways to make anonymous donations from time to time. Through his hospital colleagues, Gil was able to pick up information about families who needed help with expenses. John, whose outgoing personality won him friends everywhere, heard from people in the neighborhood or fellow parents at his kids’ schools when someone was struggling financially. The donations were always delivered by direct deposit or cashier’s check, and none of the recipients ever learned where they had come from. That rule had been in place since their first discussion in college.

Most recently, they had paid off a mortgage for a twenty-year-old and his three younger siblings. Their parents had been killed in a car accident, and the young man had insisted on petitioning for guardianship of the younger children so they wouldn’t be split up, but he was still in college and even if he dropped out, he couldn’t earn enough to support them all.  Now they had a house and a monthly allowance that mysteriously arrived on the first of each month.

“Have you talked to young Matt lately?” Gil asked.

John nodded. “I saw him at basketball practice on Tuesday.” Matt’s younger brother Jack was on the same team as Pip. “He didn’t have much time to talk, but they’re doing well. I’ve never seen anybody who’s more grateful for what he has.”

Gil smiled. “I have.”

“Who?”

“Another young guy who got custody of his brothers and sisters.”

John waved his hand to brush that off. “I was lucky. There was plenty of money and I didn’t have to prove anything to Social Services.”

“See what I mean?”

“Fine, whatever,” John said, but for a moment his thoughts went back to the terrifying time in South Carolina when he, Alex, and Eliza went to get the kids. After that, if anybody had tried to take them away from him, he would have fought to the death to keep them. He looked up and gave Gil a reluctant smile. “They turned out okay, didn’t they?”

Marcy was a set designer happily married to the up-and-coming young playwright Malik Babacar, Harry was Vice President of Laurens Enterprises, James was practicing law in New York, and Polly, the baby, was still in college.

“They did,” Gil agreed. “We’re all proud of them – and you.”

“How about some more coffee?” John suggested so they wouldn’t have to get into some emotional conversation about how well they were all doing in spite of what they had suffered in the Insurrections.

Gil agreed and signaled their waitress. When she brought the coffee, she said, “If you guys would like dessert, the pastry chef did a really nice fresh peach pie today.”

“I’m up for pie,” John responded.

Gil shook his head. “Not now, thanks, but if you have whole ones, could you box two for me to take home?”

“One for me too,” John added quickly. He looked at Gil as the waitress went off to take care of it. “Alex would kill me if I didn’t bring him pie.” John and Eliza did their best to keep Alex from subsisting entirely on caffeine and sugar, but they’d long ago realized it was pointless to try to get him to cut out desserts.

“I have a question for you,” Gil said a few minutes later, as John was starting on his pie. “When is my surprise party?”

John looked up, all wide-eyed innocence, his mouth full of pie. He chewed, swallowed, and took a sip of coffee. “What surprise party?”

Gil raised an eyebrow. “John, please. My fortieth birthday is in less than a month, and Peggy tells me we’re just having a quiet celebration at home.”

“So what’s wrong with that?”

“When has my wife ever passed up a chance to have a gigantic family festival for any event?”

John thought back over nearly twenty years of birthdays, graduations, weddings, christenings, and holidays. “Okay, never.”

“Right.”

Gil waited silently while John took another bite of pie and thought it over. “You promise to act surprised?” he asked finally.

“Of course.”

John bit his lip, a little worried. “I wasn’t supposed to tell you.”

Gil smiled. “You didn’t tell me. You just confirmed my suspicions.”

“Yeah, I guess. Anyway, it’s a relief not to have to watch what I say.”

“We still have to be careful, though. I don’t want to spoil it for her. Will it be at our house?”

Peggy and Gil had the biggest house, so most of the celebrations ended up there. It was also conveniently located in Philadelphia, halfway between the nation’s capital, where John, Alex, and Eliza lived, and New York, where Herc’s successful decorating business and Angelica’s political career were centered.

“Yeah, and it’s two weeks from Saturday.”

“How is she going to surprise me in my own house?” Gil asked.

“Nope, I’ve already revealed too much, and if she ever finds out I told, I’m going to be in serious trouble.”

“That’s true,” Gil agreed. “It’s always good to have blackmail material available.”

“Great,” John responded sardonically, but they both knew it was a joke. Peggy would never be mad at John.

“Will everybody be there?” Gil asked.

“I haven’t seen the guest list,” John told him, “but you know who Peggy would invite.”

“I knew we’d get a lot of use out of that ballroom,” Gil commented. “The family alone is nearly thirty people now, and some of the kids might bring dates.”

“By kids, I assume you mean Katie and Polly, who are legally adults.”

“Teddie’s sixteen. She could conceivably have a boyfriend.”

John shook his head. “Sixteen years. God, the day she was born … everything was so different then.”

“Indeed,” Gil agreed drily. “Now at least I have a license to practice medicine.”

“You did okay,” John reminded him, smiling. “Anyway, it will be a great party. Peggy is the best party planner ever.”

“Yes, she is, and I’m looking forward to it, even if I have to pretend I don’t know it’s going to happen. We haven’t all been together since Angelica’s wedding, and your gang from Charleston still haven’t seen the new baby. I think he’ll be the star of the show, even if it’s my birthday.”

Peggy and Gil’s youngest, Daniel Julien, was two months old. He had two brothers and three sisters, plus Katie, who was technically his aunt, but who had been raised by Peggy and Gil since she was a year old.

John shook his head. “Seven kids. You guys done yet?” He, Alex, and Eliza were raising only three, and he felt like they had their hands full all the time.

Gil shrugged. “We’ll see. Maybe it’s time to give it some thought. I’m turning forty, after all.”

“Old man.”

“You’re not that far behind me.”

“Don’t remind me. My hair’s not turning gray yet, though.”

Gil raised an eyebrow. “My wife says it makes me look distinguished.”

“Of course she does.” John couldn’t help smiling. He’d been there the day Peggy and Gil met, when they fell madly in love within hours of setting eyes on one another. He’d still never heard either of them say a negative word about the other. It worked for them, but it was quite different from his own more complicated relationship. It had taken him, Alex, and Eliza a long time to figure out how they felt about each other, and there had been plenty of angry words exchanged over the years. It had turned out okay, though, better than he’d ever dared to hope back at the beginning, and they had three amazing kids. Alex was Daddy, and he was Papi, and nobody even raised an eyebrow anymore.

“So no new projects for us?” Gil asked.

“Not that I know of. Universal health care has made a big difference, and things are a lot better than they were twenty years ago. I’ll call you if I hear about anything.”

“If not, the funds can grow a little more,” Gil said. He picked up his pie boxes, and they walked out to the parking lot in the bright summer sunshine.

“Don’t forget, you know nothing about the party,” John reminded him.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Gil responded with a smile, “but I’ll see you on the seventh.”

*          *          *          *          *

Peggy had drafted Katie and Polly into helping with the party. They were both students at Penn, and after her first year, Polly had decided she’d rather live with the Motier family than in a dorm, so she shared Katie’s room. The three of them were finalizing the details in the room they called the library. While it had two walls of crowded bookshelves and a couple of desks with computer terminals, it also contained a large table used for crafts and a big cushioned window seat with extra pillows. There were upholstered chairs and a rocking chair near the window. Katie was perched on the window seat with her knees tucked under her, while Polly sat on the floor despite the available chairs. Peggy was in the rocking chair nursing Daniel, who had already learned that his smile charmed everybody.

“Yes, you are the cutest baby boy ever,” Peggy was telling him.

“I’m going to tell Joey and AJ that you said that,” Katie threatened.

“I told them the same thing,” Peggy replied, undismayed. “Situational ethics.”

“He is cute,” Polly said.

“Yes, he is.” Peggy put him on her shoulder to burp him, loving the way his little head snuggled into her neck.

“Okay,” Katie broke in, checking something on her phone, “the band got the deposit, so they’re good, the caterer has been here a million times, so that’s all set, and I think all the RSVPs are in.”

Peggy smiled. “Martine called Angelica yesterday. They’re going to stay in New York for the week before the party so the kids can see the sights. Oh, and Jonathan got them tickets for _Sherwood._ ” Herc’s boyfriend had originated the role of Will Scarlet in the Tony-winning musical about Robin Hood. He had one more month in the show and then he and Herc were headed to Tahiti for a much-needed break.

“They’ll love it,” Polly said.

“Everybody does,” Peggy agreed. “And as soon as _Runners_ opens, we’ll have another Broadway hit to go see.”

Polly’s brother-in-law Malik had written the play about the young teens who had served as messengers during the Second Insurrection, and her sister Marcy had designed the set. The show was in rehearsal and planned to open in about six weeks.

“Oh, that reminds me,” Polly said, “I have kind of a weird request. You know the contemporary politics class I took this summer? There was a graduate student monitoring the class because she needed some stuff for her thesis, and she was, like, obsessed with everything to do with the Movement’s activity in Philadelphia during the Second Insurrection. When I told her my sister and brother had been runners, she had a million questions.”

“Mm-hmm,” Peggy murmured skeptically. “Did she know your name?”

Polly rolled her eyes. “She looked it up.”

Katie leaned down and poked her, “Ooh, a fangirl!”

Polly poked her back. “She’s like thirty-five or forty.”

“My age?” Peggy asked. “Incredibly ancient?”

“Well, not _incredibly_ …” Polly told her, laughing, “but probably too old to be a fangirl.”

It was a fact of life for all of them that their experiences during the Second Insurrection had made certain names known to everybody: the Schuyler Sisters, whose parents had been martyred in the cause of freedom; Lafayette, the Hero Doctor of the Insurrection; General Alexander Hamilton and Colonel John Laurens, who had taken back the city of Philadelphia and pulled the boards off the doors and windows of Independence Hall; General Anthony Wayne, who restored order and re-established city services.

Katie Motier and Polly Laurens-Schuyler had grown up with the public attention. Their families had been profiled in magazines and they’d been interviewed on TV. The guy they called Uncle Tony was now President, and their Uncle Alex wrote speeches for him. Aunt Angelica was Lieutenant Governor of New York and would be running for Governor next year. Their parents – their guardians, actually, since both of them had been raised by siblings after their parents’ deaths – had done an excellent job of controlling how much of the public spotlight had fallen on them. Of course, unlike Alex Hamilton and Angelica Schuyler-Church, Gil and John weren’t in the news regularly. Gil was a trauma surgeon at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, and John was an artist who worked independently. They had done all they could to provide normal childhoods, and Katie and Polly, the youngest of those born before the Second Insurrection, managed their families’ fame without much difficulty. Still, they’d both met plenty of people who wanted to hang around with them in the hopes of meeting a celebrity.

“Anyway,” Polly continued, “would it be okay if I invited her to the party? She’s really nice, and I don’t think she would turn up with an autograph book or anything like that. I think it would mean a lot to her to be able to meet John and Uncle Alex.”

Peggy wrinkled her nose thoughtfully. “You said she’s a graduate student? Do you know who her thesis advisor is?”

“Dr. Ewing. He’s good, I’ve had him for a couple of classes.”

“Did you say anything to her about the party?”

“No, absolutely not – and she didn’t hint around for an invitation or anything, she just talked about how much she admired all of you.”

“Fangirl!” Katie reiterated.

Peggy shifted the now-sleeping baby to her lap. “If she’s my age, I wonder why she wasn’t involved in the Insurrection herself.”

“Oh, didn’t I say? She was out of the country. She was living in England then.”

“Okay, that makes a little more sense. If she wasn’t here, it would be much easier for her to romanticize it all.” She shook her head. “Some of the movies I’ve seen make it look like it was all an exciting adventure. They leave out the parts about being cold and hungry and scared all the time.”

Polly turned to look up at her seriously. “I remember some of it. I remember when Desi died.”

A shadow crossed Peggy’s face. “I wish you didn’t remember that, sweetie.”

“It’s okay,” Polly told her. “I don’t think I really understood. It was the first time I saw John cry, so I knew it was something sad, but I didn’t know what it all meant.”

“We cried a lot,” Peggy said. “That’s what the movies get wrong, but I guess nobody wants to go see a movie with all the characters crying.” She brushed her hair back and smiled. “I’ll call Dr. Ewing, and as long as he gives her a referral, you can invite her. I’ll tell Gil to be extra-nice to her. What’s her name, by the way?”

“Mary,” Polly replied. “Mary Clement.”

*          *          *          *          *

Gil was not at all surprised when he was notified of a change in his schedule for his birthday weekend.

“I’m sorry, Gil,” Dr. Morgan said. “I know you requested that weekend off, but I’m going to have to ask you to work Saturday.”

So that was how Peggy was getting him out of the house while they set up for the party. He had to at least put up a show of reluctance. “There’s nobody else who can cover?” he asked. “We were planning a family day for my birthday.”

Dr. Morgan shook his head and spread his hands. “I’ve tried. You’re the only senior resident who’s even going to be in town.”

Gil shrugged. “Okay, then. If my wife has a problem with it, I’ll tell her to talk to you.”

He complained heatedly to Peggy when he got home. “How often do I request a weekend off?” he asked rhetorically. “Practically never. It’s a good thing we didn’t tell the kids we were going to the beach.” They didn’t always tell the kids in advance about a treat since Sky, who was three, would then ask every five minutes how much longer it was until the event.

“Really,” Peggy agreed. “You still have Sunday off, though, right? Maybe we can go then.”

“Maybe,” Gil conceded, “but I don’t want to go in to work exhausted on Monday.” He gave her a smile.

“Good point,” she agreed. Taking their gaggle of children on an outing required their full attention and plenty of energy. AJ at fourteen was a bit of a daredevil, and his seven-year-old brother Joey idolized him and tried to do everything he did. Fortunately Angie and Libby, twelve and ten respectively, were usually well-behaved and looked out for each other. Sky still needed constant supervision, though, and of course, now there was a new very small baby to look after. They’d had a nanny, Delphine, since Katie was a preschooler, and she was wonderful with them, but she had weekends off with rare exceptions. Peggy didn’t tell Gil that Delphine would be working on Saturday to look after the kids while she got everything set for the party. “Maybe we can take them to the beach the next Saturday,” she said now.

“I suppose, but it won’t be my birthday weekend,” Gil conceded sulkily, looking at her from under his lashes.

Peggy raised an eyebrow at him. “Now you sound like one of the kids.”

He laughed and pulled her close. She looked up at him; the day she’d met him she thought he was the best-looking man she’d ever seen. She’d never changed her opinion. Sure, there were laugh lines around his eyes and silver threaded through his curls, but he had the same spectacular smile that had struck her like lightning when she was seventeen. She stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “I love you, and I promise we’ll still celebrate your birthday.”

“Of course we will. Sometimes private celebrations are the best.” He leaned down, and this kiss was much longer.

“Dinner will be ready,” Peggy murmured, not moving away.

He kissed her again. “I suppose the children expect us to be there?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Such demanding children we have produced.” His hand was in her hair, cradling the back of her head. He looked down at her. _“Ma belle …”_

Her arms were around his waist, and she was pressed close to him. “Gil …”

_“Oui?”_

“Later.”

He sighed, and gave her one more quick kiss. “You know that I am very happy that we have all our children?”

“Of course.”

He took her hand and they walked down the stairs together. “Sometimes when I see them all, see how beautiful they are, I feel like we should make more of them.”

She laughed. “You may have mentioned that before, but let’s put that idea on hold until Daniel is a little older.”

 _“D’accord.”_ He smiled. “You didn’t say no.”

“I didn’t say no.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> John Ewing was a Professor of Ethics and of Natural Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania from 1758 until 1778. I put him in the Poli Sci department and gave him an interesting graduate student to advise.


	2. Raise a Glass

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gil's party is planned, and the guests arrive. We all get a chance to catch up. Gil pretends to be surprised and Peggy pretends she doesn't know he's pretending. The party is a smashing success, but then something unexpected happens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've read the other stories in this AU, you'll recognize all the names. If you haven't, don't worry; there won't be a quiz, and anybody you need to know about will be mentioned again.

Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, was Gil to his friends, but his wife knew to invoke the title if she needed things done. Security for the birthday party had to be tighter than usual because the President would be one of the guests. Of course, his Secret Service detail would handle most of it, but the security service the Motier family had used for years would assist. Peggy had learned by the time she was twenty that she and her husband would attract a certain amount of attention from the public. Over the years, the addition of six beautiful children to their family had kept their images in magazines and online stories, and now it was something they just lived with. They controlled press access carefully and always made sure to release a few pictures of any event, so they only occasionally had what Katie called a “crazed fan” try to crash a party.

Of course, the Secret Service had requested a guest list so they could run background checks on the guests. Most of them had been cleared long ago; the Hamilton-Schuyler-Laurens family members were well-known in government circles. Herc Mulligan and his actor boyfriend Jonathan Derrow, Aaron Burr and his teenage daughter, and the Thibaut and Félice families from France had all been to events that required security clearances. There were only a few new names that had to be cleared for this party – some of Gil’s colleagues from Penn, Polly’s graduate student friend, various plus-ones of single guests, and, of course, all the valet and catering staff. There would be at least four security officers at the front door to check names and IDs, and no other doors would be open to guests.

Peggy sighed, reviewing the list. Their first party in the ballroom had been Alex and Eliza’s wedding reception, and even with President Akhdir in attendance, it hadn’t been this complicated. There had been police officers there, of course, but it had been John and Herc who took care of the only troublemaker. Well, there’d been no reason to invite TJ to this party, since Gil didn’t have any political alliances to maintain, so she didn’t have to worry about him. Almost everybody at the party would be family or old friends, and she was looking forward to seeing all of them. She and her sisters tried to get together at least once a month, but what with kids and work and now Angelica’s campaign, it was hard. Alex, Eliza, John, and the kids would be staying over the weekend, though, so maybe they’d get some sister time in. She looked at the list one more time, glancing at the handful of unfamiliar names. It seemed like there was something she should remember, but it kept escaping her, and then Daniel was crying to be fed. _Whatever it is, it’ll come to me,_ she thought. _I’m just trying to keep track of too many things._

“We ordered a cake, right?” she asked Katie after lunch.

“No, not specifically,” Katie responded with a puzzled look. “The caterer is taking care of it.”

“Oh, of course, I knew that.”

Katie grinned. “Your brain getting overloaded?”

“I don’t know. There’s something at the back of my mind …”

“Well, you, Polly, and I have all been over every detail about a hundred times, so I think we’ve got it covered.”

“Yeah …” Peggy bent down to wipe Sky’s sticky hands. “It would be easier if I could discuss everything with Gil.”

“That would kind of spoil the surprise party thing, though,” Katie reminded her. “You want me to get Sky into her bathing suit?”

“Yes, thank you.” With school starting next week, there wouldn’t be too many more days that they would be able to spend in the pool, but the last week of August was hot and sunny. “You’ll keep an eye on her, right?”

“Of course.” Katie gave her a kiss on the cheek. “You should lie down while Daniel’s napping.”

“I think I will. You sure you’ll be okay with all the kids?”

“Mom, take a breath. Delphine is already out there with them, Polly will be home in an hour, and AJ is a qualified Red Cross lifeguard. I think we’ll manage.”

“Okay, you’re right. Wake me up if I’m still asleep when they come in.”

“Mom …”

“Got it. Love you.” She watched Katie lead Sky out the door to the pool house, and then stood for a few minutes looking through the window at the children in the pool.

Gil had insisted on a pool house with a bathroom, four shower stalls, and a washing machine, no less, so that they could shower and change without coming into the house with dripping bathing suits. “It will be much less work in the long run,” he had said, and of course he was right. When the kids were done swimming for the day, somebody would toss all the bathing suits in the washer to rinse the chlorine out, and they would all return to the house in dry clothes. It made sense, but like so many things that seemed a matter of course to Gil, who had grown up in a castle, it wouldn’t have occurred to her. She smiled and went upstairs, thinking about marrying Gil back when they had no idea how things would end up, before she realized how much money he had, when they were sharing a two-bedroom cabin with her sisters, Alex, John, and Herc. _One bathroom for eight people,_ she recalled. _How did we ever …?_ But the answer was simple, really. They did what they had to do to survive, to keep the Movement going, to overthrow George King’s despotic government.

The baby’s crib was in the large sitting area of the master bedroom. All the children had slept there as long as she nursed them. She looked down at her youngest sleeping soundly and thought about the possibility that he would be her last baby. She didn’t know if she was ready for that yet. There was plenty of time to make the decision, though, and for now, she would enjoy the time she had with him. He let her nap for a little more than an hour before he woke up fussing, wet and hungry. She got him into a dry diaper, then curled up with him on the couch. Gil came in a few minutes later, dropped a kiss on her forehead and one on the baby’s, and then sat down to keep them company.

“He let me sleep for an hour this afternoon,” Peggy said.

“That was very considerate of him.”

“The kids were all in the pool.”

“They still are,” Gil smiled. “Sky showed me how she could jump off the side a few minutes ago.”

“Somebody was with her, right?”

“Of course. AJ was catching her. They were both having fun.”

“He likes being a big brother – at least most of the time,” Peggy said.

“He’s good with Sky, and she thinks he’s wonderful.”

“She does. I love seeing the kids play with each other.” She shifted Daniel to a more comfortable position. “This guy will be running around outside next summer.”

“He’ll always have somebody to play with.” That’s why Gil, an only child, had always wanted a big family. He’d lost both his parents young, and had lived with his aunt and uncle. They were very kind, and he had loved them dearly, but it had been a lonely childhood for a solitary little boy in a big castle.

“Lots of brothers and sisters and cousins,” Peggy smiled. Eliza’s three kids were her children’s only first cousins by blood, but they’d always counted John’s younger brothers and sisters, Teddie Burr, and the Félice kids in France as bonus cousins. When Katie and Polly were in elementary school, they had made a chart of the family relationships, using different colored markers and carefully printed footnotes. Peggy had had it framed, and it still hung on the wall in the family room. “Back to school for the kids on Tuesday,” she said now. “I still can’t believe AJ’s a sophomore.”

“So’s Katie,” Gil reminded her, “but college, not high school.”

“And Polly’s a junior. How does the time go so fast?”

Gil shook his head, looking back. Peggy was right; it seemed such a short time ago that Katie had been a baby, but for every moment of the time that had passed, he had been grateful for what he had. He got out of his chair and went to kneel on the floor beside the couch, so he could touch his wife and son. “How lucky we are,” he said.

Peggy leaned forward to kiss him. “You did say ‘dozens of children and grandchildren,’ remember?”

He laughed. “I did say that. I’d known you three hours, and it didn’t intimidate you in the slightest.”

“Of course it didn’t. How could it? I already loved you.” Her eyes filled, and she reached out to brush back his curls. “Oh, Gil, I’m so happy.”

*          *          *          *          *

Alex, Eliza, John, and the kids arrived in time for lunch on Saturday and found, as they expected, that the Motier house was in a state of controlled chaos. John’s sister Marcy and her husband Malik were already there and had been placed in charge of the older children, while Delphine was looking after the little ones.

“What’s the cut-off age between big kid and little kid?” John asked.

“It’s supposed to be ten, so Lauren, Joey, and Sky will be watching Disney videos upstairs, but Marlie probably wants to hang out with Angie and Libby, so we’re letting her slide.”

Marlie, who was nine, gave her aunt a big grin. “Thank you!”

“That means you’ll have stuff to do,” Marcy reminded her.

“I know,” Marlie told her. “Uncle Malik is going to teach us how to fold napkins.”

“That’s how he impressed me all those years ago,” Marcy said.

Marlie gave her a confused look and headed off to find her cousins, but John laughed. “Swept you right off your feet with the napkin folding, did he?”

“Well, that, and his way with words.” Even as a teenager, Malik had had a gift of expressing himself, and fifteen-year-old Marcy had indeed been smitten.

Malik himself walked in then, kissed his wife, clapped John on the shoulder, and picked up six-year-old Lauren, who was still clinging to her father’s hand. “What are you doing, Lauren? he asked.

“We’re going to watch movies,” she told him.

“Then we should get the popcorn, right?”

Lauren nodded eagerly, her curls bouncing, and Malik took her off to the kitchen where his parents, who had worked for Gil and Peggy for years, were helping the caterers. He was barely out of the room when the doorbell rang. Marcy looked out the window. “It’s the florist,” she said. “I’ll deal with him, you go find Peggy. I think she’s in the ballroom.”

She was, and threw herself into John’s arms when he entered the room. “I know I’ve forgotten something,” she said dramatically.

John gave her a hug and a kiss on the cheek, “No, you haven’t. You always say that.”

She nodded. “Gil calms me down, though, and he can’t this time.”

“I’ll do it then.” He put his hand on her shoulder and said in a ridiculously phony French accent, _“But ma sheree, zere is nozzing to woree about. You are so wonnerfool zat you cannot make a meestake.”_

It was awful, but it made her laugh. “You sound nothing like Gil, but thanks. Where are Eliza and Alex and the kids?”

John shrugged. “I lost track of them somewhere downstairs. Marlie was looking for Angie and Libby, Pip went to find AJ, and Malik took Lauren to get the popcorn. I’d bet any amount of money that Alex is in the kitchen looking for coffee and cookies.”

“You know Fatou made him cookies, don’t you?”

“I assumed. She always does.”

“We’re throwing a party for a hundred people, but she finds time to make cookies for Alex.”

“It’s because I’m charming,” said a muffled voice behind her, and Peggy turned around to see Alex with a mouthful of cookie, two more in his hands. He gave her a somewhat crumby kiss, and Peggy hugged him and Eliza, who was right behind him.

“What can I do to help?” Eliza asked.

Peggy looked around, waving her arms vaguely. “There’s stuff … I’m waiting for the florist.”

“He’s here,” John told her. “Marcy’s dealing.”

“Okay, good. I’m going to go check on the baby, then. Eliza, come with me.”

Alex looked after them fondly, then popped another cookie into his mouth and looked around. “Pretty impressive set-up,” he mumbled.

“It always is,” John agreed.

There were more than a dozen tables with snowy white tablecloths set up around the perimeter of the ballroom, leaving the dance floor open. There was also additional seating on the upholstered velvet window seats. The band would be on the stage at the east end of the enormous room. Behind the stage was a compact, well-equipped kitchen that the caterers would use during the party, as well as a storeroom where the tables and chairs were usually kept. That room had long ago been selected by the Secret Service as a safe room, since it had no windows and only two doors, one that opened into a backstage hallway, and another that led to a narrow, unobtrusive staircase that went all the way down to the first floor and an exit directly to the driveway behind the house. That staircase, as well as the steel doors, had been installed on the advice of Philadelphia Police Commissioner Roger Stayner, a good friend who had worked closely with Alex and Tony in the days when they were trying to get the city of Philadelphia back to a normal status after the Second Insurrection.

“Who’s going to be here besides all of us?” Alex asked.

“According to Polly, half the city of Philadelphia – you know, a lot of people from the hospital, and Gil’s on a few charity boards, so those people. Some of the professors from Penn. You know what it’s like, Alex, everybody wants to get invited to Lafayette’s party.”

“Yeah, well, I have to say, Gil handles all that stuff well. I see pictures of us online after every party, but only a few and only the ones with the most flattering compositions.”

“So none of any of us with our mouths open, or of you and Angelica arguing?”

Alex grinned. “Not so far. I wonder if Peggy has got any photographers scheduled for tonight. I should ask her.”

“Yeah, I think Gil usually handles that.”

“I’ll check.” Alex paused and looked around again. “Do you think Gil will be surprised?”

John shrugged a little uncomfortably. “Gil’s pretty smart …”

“He knows, doesn’t he?”

“Well …”

“Did you tell him?”

 _“No!”_ John responded immediately, then bit his lip. “Not exactly. He sort of figured it out.”

Alex smiled. “He’ll never let Peggy know, though.”

“No, he won’t.”

*          *          *          *          *

Angelica and her husband JB arrived at around the same time as Daniel and Martine Félice, who had long ago been Danny Phoenix and Patty Manning. Angelica kissed her sisters, but she and JB stepped back to allow the three Félice kids, all teenagers, a few minutes to sort themselves out.

Gabe, the oldest, looked around, and then grinned at Peggy. “Where’s Katie?” he asked.

“I think she and Marcy were rounding up the big kids to start carrying things upstairs from the kitchen.”

Gabe took off for the kitchen just as Pip came through the hall and yelled, “Yo, Timo!”

Timo, whose full name was Timothée Jean Gilbert Félice, responded, _“Philippe! Comment tu vas?”_

 _“Bien, toi?”_ Then he gestured toward the stairs and rolled his eyes. _“Montons, on va plier les serviettes.”_

 _“Encore une fois?”_ Timo queried, apparently not thrilled.

Pip gave him a serious face. _“C’est notre travail à nous.”_

Timo laughed. _“Crétin,”_ he said, smacking Pip playfully on the head.

Eliza blinked. “Good to know Pip’s French is useful.”

“Everybody needs to speak more than one language,” Danny pronounced sententiously, then looked around. “Where’s John?”

“I think he’s with Alex, meeting with the security staff,” Eliza said. “They were going over the safe room …”

“I know where it is,” Danny told her, and went up the stairs.

“Now can I see the baby?” Martine asked eagerly.

“Oh, of course!” Peggy responded. “Francie, do you want to see him too? Or do you want to go upstairs with the other kids and help set up?”

Francie nodded. “I want to see the baby first. He’s named for my dad, right?”

“He is, Daniel Julien, for your dad and Julien.”

Julien Thibaut was Gil’s cousin. He and his wife Sophie actually occupied what was called the “new wing” of Gil’s castle in Auvergne, the Chateau de Chavaniac, while Danny, Patty, and the kids lived in the “old wing.” It was an arrangement that had begun out of necessity, but had continued because it worked well for all of them.

Francie admired baby Daniel and held him for a few minutes, then decided to go join the other kids in whatever project Marcy and Malik had organized. Martine took the baby to introduce Danny to his namesake, and Peggy, Angelica, and Eliza took a few minutes for themselves with cups of tea in the library.

“Everything will come together just fine,” Eliza said, noting the frown creasing Peggy’s forehead.

Peggy sighed. “I know, I know. I’m just sure I’ve forgotten something.”

Eliza started counting off on her fingers. "Food? Champagne? Music? Flowers? Speeches? Security? Photographer?"

Peggy nodded after each one.

“See, you're fine,” Angelica assured her. “There’s going to be music and food, so your guests will have a good time. Even if you’ve forgotten some minor detail like – oh, I don’t know, the matching napkin rings? – nobody will care.”

Peggy laughed. “We don’t have napkin rings. Malik has taught the kids to fold the napkins into artistic shapes. I think they’re doing crowns tonight.”

“Marlie was actually excited about doing that,” Eliza responded.

“It’s Malik’s secret skill,” Peggy said. “He learned it back when his parents owned a restaurant, and he did all the napkins for our first Thanksgiving here, remember? Now he just supervises.”

“It keeps the kids busy,” Angelica pointed out.

“The big kids are fine,” Peggy said. “They amuse each other. The little ones are always happy with movies and popcorn.”

“What about the grown-up kids?” Eliza asked. “I noticed that Gabriel asked right away where Katie was.”

“They’ve known each other since they were four,” Peggy told her, “and they don’t see each other very often, so of course he’d want to talk to her.”

“Okay,” Eliza said mildly.

“What, you think … Katie and Gabe?”

“It just crossed my mind.”

Peggy considered it. “Well, I guess it’s possible. They’re only nineteen, though, so really young.”

Angelica gave an unladylike snort. “Peg, sweetie, you were married when you were nineteen.”

“Shut up,” Peggy told her. “Anyway, listen to us, gossiping about the kids. I need to put you two to work because if I’m not mistaken, I hear my baby boy demanding to be fed.”

She had no sooner spoken then Martine walked into the room with an obviously hungry baby and handed him to Peggy. “I changed him, but I can’t feed him,” she said with a smile.

Peggy settled him to her breast with the ease of a mother who had nursed six children, and smiled at Martine. “Thanks for bringing him down. What did Danny think of him?”

“He says he’s almost as cute as our kids, but then John and Alex had to say that their kids were cuter, and it was time for me to leave.”

“Nothing ever changes,” Angelica commented with a sigh, thinking back to Alex, John, and Danny in the days of the First Insurrection, strategizing, producing forged documents, and trying to out-smartass each other as a way of dealing with the constant danger in New York City.

Martine laughed. “You’re right. As I left, I heard my husband tell John that he could still take him down.”

Peggy put her hand to her forehead. “And Gil not here to provide medical care.”

“Maybe JB can step in and keep things sane,” Eliza suggested hopefully.

“Nope,” Angelica said. “He’s scared of Alex.”

*          *          *          *          *

Gil usually worked until five thirty, but Dr. Morgan had promised to keep him a little later, so at six o’clock, Katie took up her position by the upstairs front window to watch for his car. The valet service had taken all the guests cars to a nearby school parking lot by pre-arrangement, and the President’s vehicle was parked near the secure emergency exit, so Gil wouldn’t see it when he pulled into the driveway. Everyone was in the ballroom except Katie, who would text Peggy the minute she saw Gil’s car, and Angie and Libby, who had their role to play as soon as their father got home. The crowd in the ballroom was loud, and Peggy had no idea how she was going to get them all quiet when Gil entered the house, but she knew she’d have a lot of help. Even though she was expecting it, she jumped when her phone chimed. She read Katie’s text: _Just came around the corner._

“Lights!” she yelled, and Malik flipped the switch so Gil wouldn’t see the ballroom lit up when he got to the house. They all sat in the dim light, whispering nervously. A few minutes later, Katie texted again: _Now!_

Alex stood on a chair and yelled, “Everybody shut up!”

There was silence, and in a few seconds, they heard the faint sounds of the front door opening and closing and Angie and Libby’s voices greeting their dad. Peggy couldn’t distinguish their words from two stories up, but she knew they were telling him that they had made him something special for his birthday, and that he had to come up to the ballroom to see it. That wouldn’t give anything away. Over the years, Gil’s children had presented him with everything from a cardboard model of the Chateau de Chavaniac to an original song about the Battle of Times Square.

In minutes, they heard Gil on the stairs, saying, _“Mais j’ai aucune idée, mes filles, qu’est-ce que vous avez fait?”_

As he entered the room, the lights went on and, as at all surprise parties, everybody stood up yelling, “Surprise!” and “Happy birthday!” Angie and Libby were jumping up and down with excitement at their part in surprising their father, and Gil’s eyes sought out Peggy’s across the room. He found her and blew her a kiss as friends, including the President, the First Lady, and the Philadelphia Police Commissioner, crowded around to shake his hand and wish him a happy fortieth birthday. Gil was courteous to all of them, but Peggy, who knew him so well, saw that he was looking in the throng for Alex, John, Herc, and Danny, and his greetings to them were as warm as to President Wayne. She also saw the look on his face when a tall, dark-haired guy stepped forward. Ben Tallmadge worked in the CIA and kept a very low profile. Whatever pictures might end up on the internet after this party, none of them would show Ben’s face. He didn’t even leave the capital very often, and the fact that he was there at all was a testament to his regard for Gil. Gil threw an arm around his shoulder and said something that made him laugh, and then the band started playing, and Peggy remembered that she was the hostess of this event and began to mingle, greeting her guests.

There were several that she didn’t know by sight, most of them from the hospital or Gil’s charity work. Polly introduced her to her graduate student friend Mary and her date, and she welcomed them politely, thinking that Katie had been right. Mary looked dazzled by the presence of so many important people in one room, as well as by the elegance of the room itself with the gleaming china and silver, the crystal vases of fresh flowers on every table, the glittering chandeliers reflecting the sparkle of sequins and jewels. Peggy was wearing a deep violet satin gown with a low neck, set off with a diamond and amethyst necklace and earrings. Her hair was swept up in an elegant twist with just a few strands curling on her neck. “Oh, Mrs. Motier, you are so beautiful,” Mary breathed. Peggy thanked her politely while Polly stifled a giggle, and Katie, a few feet away, rolled her eyes and, as Peggy walked by, muttered, “Fangirl!”

Peggy had to remind herself that while this life was normal for her now, she hadn’t been born to it as Gil and John had been, and it had taken a while for her to be comfortable in evening gowns and diamond necklaces. She could spare a little sympathy for Mary, who seated herself at an out-of-the-way table with her boyfriend. The simple black dress she wore was probably her very best, but it was appropriate for the occasion. Peggy threw her a smile as she moved on to talk to Jack and Lydia Sullivan, Liz Burgin, Rafe Peale, Tim and Maya Dwight, Hugh Mackey, Becky Jenkins, and dozens of others. Aaron Burr and his beautiful daughter Teddie had driven up from Charleston with John’s brother Harry. Teddie was over at one of the kids’ tables with AJ and Francie, looking lovely in her rose-colored party dress. “She is a stunner,” Peggy told Teddie’s father.

“Looks just like her mother,” Burr said proudly.

“She does,” Peggy agreed.  She’d always thought Desi was the most beautiful woman she’d ever known. More than once over the years, she’d wished that Burr would meet someone and fall in love again, but it had never happened, and in only a few more years, Teddie would be off to college and he’d be alone. Gil would tell her not to mind everybody else’s business, but she just wanted people to be happy. To that end, she was glad to be introduced to Harry’s girlfriend Susan, whom she’d heard about but hadn’t met. She was pretty, with a sweet smile, and seemed nice, so Peggy approved, hoping first impressions would be correct.

She moved on and found Herc and Jonathan, who had arrived at the last minute, talking theater and set design with Malik and Marcy, and sat down for a few minutes at their table.

Jonathan gave her his charming grin. “You did an amazing job with the party,” he said.

“Thank you,” she smiled back. “I had tons of help.”

“You look absolutely gorgeous,” Marcy told her.

“Not bad yourself,” Peggy replied. Marcy’s pale sage-green taffeta dress had a slim skirt with a slit up the side, and Marcy was wearing silver sandals with very high heels. “You’re going to knock them out on the dance floor.” She stood up. “I think the crowd around my husband has thinned out, so I’ll go say hello to him.”

For the moment at least, the only person next to Gil was John, so she had no hesitation putting her arms around her husband’s neck and giving him a kiss. _“Salut, chéri,”_ she said. _“Joyeux anniversaire.”_

 _“Tous mes anniversaires sont joyeux à cause de toi,”_ he told her.

“Were you surprised?” she asked, her eyebrow up.

“But of course!”

That was much too emphatic. Peggy turned to John. “Was it you?”

“Was what me?” John asked.

Peggy rolled her eyes and looked back at Gil. “It doesn’t matter, you know. I didn’t for a minute think I’d fool you.”

He laughed and put his hand on her shoulder, one finger gently and discreetly stroking her neck. _“Tu me connais, ma belle.”_

She smiled, her eyes on his, took his other hand in hers and ran her thumb back and forth across his palm. “Mm-hmm.”

They stood like that for a minute, and then John cleared his throat rather loudly. When that didn’t get their attention, he said, “Yo, guys, knock it off.”

“Knock what off?” Peggy asked, genuinely puzzled.

“The eye-fucking.”

Gil turned to look at him. “Excuse me? Are you telling me not to look at my beautiful wife?”

John sighed. “Gil, we’ve had this conversation before. It’s not that you’re looking at her, it’s … you know, the _way_ you’re looking at her. And actually, it’s pretty obvious that you’re looking down the front of her dress.”

Gil smiled. “I am indeed. She is very lovely.”

Peggy was giggling, but she hadn’t let go of Gil’s hand. “I think my brother wants us to behave,” she said.

“Well, Crazy Tony _is_ the President now, and there _are_ people around with cameras,” John pointed out, “so …”

Gil kissed his wife lightly and sighed. _“Les Américains sont tellement prudes.”_

Peggy grabbed John’s hand and pulled both of them along with her. “Come on, let’s go sit down. They’re about to start serving dinner.”

Dinner included all of Gil’s favorites and finished with waiters going from table to table with trays of desserts. Alex took two, of course, and even Eliza didn’t say anything. “Chocolate mousse and crème brulée,” he murmured, delighted, starting with the crème brulée. “Oh, this is good.” He looked up at Eliza. “What? I have to give a speech after dinner. I need to keep up my strength.”

John laughed. “I’ve seen you give speeches when you’d had nothing but a cup of oatmeal in three days.”

Alex nodded. “You’re right, you’re right. It’s easier when I’m not hungry, though.”

There were still times when Alex got so focused on a project that he forgot to eat, sleep, or drink water, but it didn’t happen often now. Eliza smiled at John, glad that keeping Alex healthy wasn’t her sole responsibility. Alex saw the smile and looked from his wife to John and back again. “You guys take good care of me,” he said softly.

Alex’s after-dinner speech was everything they had all come to expect from the man who had been known as the Voice of the Insurrection. He talked about his long friendship with Gil, about Gil’s refusal to return to France and safety during the First Insurrection, about his work in the illegal St. Dismas Free Clinic, the only source of medical care for some people in the city. He told his audience about the nearly three years between the First and Second Insurrections, time when the Movement went underground and they had to go into hiding. He gave a charming account of how Gil met Peggy and fell in love with her. He talked about the medical care Gil provided through all that time and into the Second Insurrection, everything from treating gunshot wounds to delivering babies. Finally, he spoke of his admiration for the man himself, born into wealth and privilege, but choosing to use his money and position to help as many others as possible. “And so, in closing, I ask you to stand with me,” he said. “Please raise a glass to one of the finest men I’ve ever known, Marie _-_ Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette.”

Everybody stood, raised their glasses of champagne – or sparkling apple juice at the kids’ tables – and drank the toast. Then Gil stood to thank Alex and the roomful of friends for their good wishes, to talk about how happy he was that they had come to celebrate with him. Gil was much more reserved than Alex, and didn’t usually share his feelings, but tonight he said, “There was a time when I thought none of us would make it to thirty, let alone forty.” He paused to look at Alex, John, Angelica, Tony, Burr, and finally Peggy. “I am grateful beyond any words I can express in any language to be here tonight, and every bit as grateful for all of you.” He sat down quickly, despite the applause, and the band began to play dance music.

Gil led Peggy out onto the dance floor for the first slow dance. “Do we have to behave ourselves?” he asked.

“I’m afraid so. John has turned into some sort of etiquette cop.”

“Only when we have very important guests and there could be embarrassing publicity. When it’s just the family, he approves of me.”

She laughed. “He always approves of you, he just doesn’t want a photo of you looking down my dress to end up on Twitter.”

“I’ll make up for it later,” he promised.

“Of course you will.”

Alex was crossing the room to say hello to Rafe Peale when he heard a voice just behind him. “Hello, Alex.”

He turned around and his face froze. He would have known her anywhere. Her hair was different, and she was twenty years older, but the topaz eyes hadn’t changed at all. “How have you been?” she asked, smiling up at him.

“Fuck!” said Alex. “Bloody fucking hell!” Then he yelled for John.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Herc's boyfriend Jonathan Derrow is of course Jonathan Groff, with the surname composed of letters drawn from his middle name (Drew) and last name. Yes, I also considered Fredfrog, but this is not a comedy.  
> Who do you suppose just said hello to Alex? Why is he upset?  
> I'd love to hear what you think about this story.


	3. A Hot Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex recognizes two people who crashed Gil's birthday party. Gil wants a gun. Alex is worried, but it's hard to tell if he's worried more about the party crashers or Gil shooting somebody. Danny helps Ben with security.

John took one look and shouted at Danny to alert the Secret Service, and then all hell broke loose. Alex charged across the room and screamed at Peggy, “Do you want to tell me what the absolute fucking hell Maria Lewis and Sam Seabury are doing in your house?”

Peggy stared at him wide-eyed. “I don’t … I didn’t …”

John had hold of Alex’s arm, trying to pull him back without much success, and Eliza was there almost immediately. “She didn’t know,” Eliza said. “She couldn’t have known.”

Four Secret Service agents grabbed Tony, Molly, and the kids, and rushed them into the safe room. Two more, guns drawn, stood at the door, while another pair took charge of the couple that Alex had called Maria Lewis and Sam Seabury.

It was Angelica and Herc who got to Gil first – and a good thing, Angelica said later, because a murder charge wasn’t what you wanted in the family. Sixteen years ago, Gil had come very close to killing Maria Lewis; they didn’t want him to finish the job now. They dragged him out of the ballroom, Angelica frantically talking a mile a minute, inventing a story about someone injured downstairs. It didn’t make much sense, but it distracted him enough that they were able to get him into the library before he shook them off and demanded angrily, “What the hell is going on?”

Herc locked the door and placed himself in front of it. Gil turned and glared at him, and Angelica took her brother-in-law’s hand and said steadily, “You have to listen to me.”

Gil looked down at her, his face expressionless. She knew that was a bad sign. “All right,” he said. “Talk to me.”

“Somehow, and I have no idea how, so don’t ask me, Maria Lewis and Sam Seabury are here.”

Gil’s face didn’t change. “Where?”

Angelica glanced at Herc and then back. “Upstairs, in the ballroom.”

Gil dropped her hand and strode to the door, shoving Herc out of the way. Herc spun around and got a firm grip on Gil’s arm, holding him back. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“Upstairs. My wife and children are there. Get your hands off me. Don’t think I won’t hurt you if I have to.” Gil’s voice was quiet and calm, but his breath was coming a little faster.

Herc was strong, but he knew Gil was at least his match, and, fueled by anger, he’d break Herc’s arm without a second thought.

“Gil, for the love of God, listen,” Angelica pleaded. “There are a dozen Secret Service agents there. Peggy and the kids are safe. John and Eliza are with them.”

“Does John have a gun?” Gil asked.

“What the fuck?” Herc said. “ _Of course_ John doesn’t have a gun.”

“I do,” Gil told him, his voice still icily calm. “You need to get out of my way so I can get it.”

“Jesus Christ!” Angelica snapped, “Do you _want_ to get arrested?”

*          *          *          *          *

Peggy looked around wildly, saw that Gil, Angelica, and Herc were no longer in the room and turned on Alex. “Where’s Gil?” she demanded furiously.

Eliza made immediate decisions. “Burr, you’re with me. Marcy, Malik, corral the kids. Alex … Alex, listen to me!”

Alex was yelling at Peggy. “How can you stand there and tell me you didn’t know?”

Peggy snapped. “Fuck you, Alex.” She gathered up her violet satin skirt and took off running. Alex tore after her, but even after six kids and even in high heels, she was still faster than any of them. She kicked off the high heels somewhere on the first flight of stairs, and Alex tripped over one of them, going down the last three steps on his knees.

In the ballroom, John picked up the microphone. “Don’t worry, folks. A little issue with somebody whose ID may not have been valid. There’s no danger. Hey, Commissioner Stayner, can you confirm that for us?”

Roger Stayner stepped up. “That’s absolutely correct. The Secret Service got the First Family out of the room as a precaution, but the band is going to play some more music for us. We’re also going to have another round of champagne.” He gave a nod to the catering director, who signaled the staff for more champagne.

Eliza and Burr began circulating from table to table, making small talk and minimizing the disturbance. They smiled and encouraged people to get up and dance.

“You know how it is,” Eliza said more than once. “They’re hypervigilant with the President. Everything’s fine, though.”

“No, of course the party’s not over,” Burr replied to questions. “I’m sure Gil will be back in a few minutes.”

Marcy and Malik had all the children from toddlers to teenagers in a circle at the west end of the room, playing Name Five. “You start, Sky,” Malik said. “Name five colors.” Sky made her way through red, blue, green, pink, and yellow, then Marcy told Pip, “Name five military generals who became President.” Pip snorted and rattled off seven before Malik told him to shut up. “Truly his father’s son,” he muttered to Marcy.

“Which father?” she asked facetiously.

“The mouthy one.” They moved on to Angie with five Impressionist painters, then asked Lauren for five green vegetables, and the game proceeded. By then, Katie and Gabriel had joined them.

“Can you guys manage this?” Marcy asked Katie quietly. “I want to find out what’s going on. Where’s Polly?”

“Yeah, we’ve got it,” Katie responded. She bit her lip. “The Secret Service wanted to talk to Polly. I’m not sure where she is now.”

Marcy felt her stomach twist into a knot, but she just nodded, looking around for John. John would know exactly what had happened, and, more than that, John would fix anything that was wrong. He always had.

*          *          *          *          *

Once the President and his family were secure, the head of the Presidential detail pulled in Ben Tallmadge. “The President tells me that the woman General Hamilton recognized opposed the Movement in Philadelphia during the Second Insurrection. She was allied with the Shippens, and she and her former partner – not this guy – were responsible for the death of Theodosia Burr. They probably also murdered at least one civilian before the fighting began. Nobody had heard from her in all this time. They’d assumed she was dead, but it looks like she left the country and was living under another name.”

“And you found none of this when you ran a security check?” Ben asked. “She must have had a hell of a cover story.”

The agent flushed. “Sir, we checked back ten years, and there was nothing. She’s a graduate student at Penn, and her advisor vouched for her …”

“Do you know what she wanted here?”

“She says she wanted to catch up with an old friend.”

“Who would that be?”

“Um … General Hamilton, sir.”

 _“Shit!”_ Ben ran his hand over his hair. “What’s her name?”

“She’s gone by Mary Clement for more than ten years. She lived in England until two years ago, and …”

“Her name? Her real name?”

“Still verifying, but it seems to be Maria Lewis or maybe Maria Reynolds.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Ben knew who she was. “Send me whatever you’ve found. I’ll talk to her. Who’s the guy with her?”

“His name is Samuel Seabury. That’s the only name he’s ever used. His family were big supporters of King, and they lost a lot of money when the corporate subsidies were cut. He’s kind of knocked around for the last twenty years or so, changed jobs several times, but he’s never been in serious trouble.”

“Yeah, Sam Seabury was always an idiot,” Ben said. “I want to talk to them.”

“Of course, sir. They’re … uh … they’re in the kitchen.”

“The _kitchen?_ ”

“Handcuffed to chairs, sir, and two of the private security guards are with them, along with the French guy who alerted us. Colonel Laurens told us he was cleared for anything we needed.”

Ben thought for a minute, then gave a brief laugh. “Oh, right, the _French_ guy. Well, if he’s in charge, we’re good. I’ll get as much information as I can, and you’ll get a full report. You’ll brief the FBI, right?”

“Yes, sir, and probably the NSA. That will be up to the President.”

“And you’ll also review your background check procedures?”

“Yes, sir, absolutely.”

“All right. You know how to reach me.”

*          *          *          *          *

Gil’s response to Angelica was interrupted by noise on the other side of the door. They heard Peggy yell, “Let me in!” and Gil lunged past Herc, twisted the lock and threw open the door. Peggy landed in his arms, sobbing. Alex limped to a stop behind her, and his eyes met Gil’s over Peggy’s head.

“The children?” Gil asked.

“Marcy and Malik took charge of all the kids,” Alex said. “Yours, mine, Danny’s, everybody’s. They don’t even know what happened.”

Gil nodded, his mouth tight. Alex reached out and put a hand on his arm. “They’re fine,” he said softly. “Everybody’s safe.”

Gil nodded again, then bent to kiss the top of his wife’s head. “ _Chut, chérie, ça va, tout va bien. Ne t’en fais pas.”_

“I didn’t know,” Peggy managed to choke out.

“I know, _chérie,_ I know. Of course you didn’t. You couldn’t have.”

Angelica looked at Alex. “Where is she?”

“Secret Service took her,” Alex said briefly. He shook his head. “How did I not see her in the crowd?”

“Too many people,” Herc responded, “and we weren’t looking.”

“We’ve gotten too used to being safe.” Alex’s voice was bitter.

“That’s not a bad thing,” Angelica told him.

Alex’s mouth twisted. “Isn’t it?” He gazed at her, his eyes shadowed, and it took her back nearly twenty years to when she never went out the door without a gun.

She reached out for him. “Alex …”

He shook off her hand. “I have to go back upstairs and talk to the agents, see what they’re going to do. They want to interview Polly.”

Peggy spun around at that. “Polly? Why?”

Alex blew out an impatient breath. “Polly was the one she targeted to get in here. Polly got her an invitation.”

“The graduate student Polly asked me about? That was her? But I talked to her.” Peggy’s hand went to her mouth. “Oh, my God, I talked to her.” Her throat moved convulsively, and she ran out of the room, Angelica right behind her.

“Peggy only saw her once, for a few minutes,” Herc said. “Maria had blood all over her face and she looked like hell. There’s no way Peggy would have recognized her. It’s not Peggy’s fault, Alex.”

“I know,” Alex admitted, shoving his hair back. “It’s not Polly’s fault either. We all thought Maria was dead.”

Gil watched the door, waiting for Peggy to come back. “She hadn’t even crossed my mind in years,” he said coolly.

 _I hadn’t forgotten her,_ Alex might have said. He could see the scene as clearly as if it had happened yesterday, Maria bleeding on the floor with broken glass all around her, Gil’s foot on her neck, within millimeters of crushing her windpipe. Alex had always wondered if Gil would have killed her if he and John hadn’t gotten there in time. He suspected that he would have, and then he probably would have buried her in the back yard, never mentioned it, and slept just fine. There was a depth of ruthlessness in Gil that he would never understand. He was the most loving husband and father imaginable, a brilliant and compassionate surgeon, and yet … even Alex had no idea how many Gil had killed in the Insurrections.

And Maria had threatened Katie.

 _I need to make sure somebody stays with Gil,_ he thought. _There’s a real possibility that he’ll kill her tonight._

Peggy and Angelica came back in then, Peggy pale, but calmer. She crossed to her husband and took his hands. “I wanted you to have a nice party, _chéri._ ”

Gil managed a smile. “It’s certainly going to be one I remember. Maybe we should go back upstairs and reassure our guests that all is well.”

Peggy nodded. “We can stop and check on the baby on the way.”

“All right.” Gil looked down at her bare feet. “What became of your shoes?”

“I couldn’t run in them,” Peggy said simply.

“They’re at the bottom of the stairs,” Alex told her. “I fell over them.”

“Sorry,” Peggy said in the voice that means _I’m not sorry_.

Alex grabbed Angelica’s arm before she could follow them out. “Make sure John or Roger or somebody stays close to Gil,” he said quietly. “I have no idea what might be in his mind.”

“He has a gun,” Herc said.

 _“What?_ Where?”

“Not on him. He was trying to get away from me to go get it when Peggy came in and calmed him down.”

“I don’t suppose he said whether he owns it legally or not?”

“We didn’t get that far.”

“Jesus Christ,” Alex muttered. “I thought it was over.”

*          *          *          *          *

Two of the private security employees, on the orders of the Secret Service agents, had handcuffed their charges to kitchen chairs. They were currently seated at a small table in a corner of the backstage kitchen, definitely not an ideal situation, as the caterers were still working.

The woman was in her late thirties with dark hair and particularly striking golden-brown eyes. She was sitting silently, her beautiful eyes following the catering staff as they went about their work. The man was a few years older, tall and thin with straight hair and a slightly receding chin. He was demanding loudly and repeatedly that he be allowed to call his lawyer. Nobody was paying any attention to him.

Danny Phoenix, AKA Daniel Félice, was leaning against a counter sipping a cup of coffee. There was plenty of champagne, but he wanted caffeine more than he wanted alcohol right now. When Ben Tallmadge walked in, he sketched a salute and smiled. “Just like old times, right?”

“Yeah,” Ben replied. “In fact, I’m pretty sure I saw an old friend from Yale dancing with a grown-up Katie Schuyler a little while ago.”

Danny’s face softened with pride. “Looks just like him, doesn’t he?”

“God, yes. He and Katie were chattering in French nineteen to the dozen, so it was all a little disorienting, but I’m glad I got to see him.”

“After we get these idiots sorted out, come talk to us. I know Patty wants to catch up. Is your wife here?”

Ben shook his head. “No, her mom had surgery a couple of days ago, so Mary’s there for a while. We all need to get together, though. I want to talk to your son.”

“He knows about you,” Danny said. “We only told him the good stuff, though.”

“Thanks,” Ben replied drily.

“If you two are done arranging your social calendars,” Sam Seabury remarked sarcastically, “perhaps you will give me my phone so I can call my lawyer.”

Danny shrugged and looked at Ben. “You want to give him his phone?”

Ben shook his head. “I don’t even know where his phone is.”

“I do, but I’m not going to give it to him,” Danny said.

“I have a legal right to make a call!” Seabury snapped.

Danny ignored him and spoke to Ben again. “They always complain about their rights, don’t they?”

Ben nodded. “They do. I don’t think that phone call thing even applies here, because these two haven’t even been arrested, have they?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

Maria spoke for the first time. “If we haven’t been arrested, this is false imprisonment. We can sue.”

Ben looked back at Danny and shrugged. “Huh, I guess I’d better arrest them then.”

“You probably should,” Danny agreed.

Ben turned to the two at the table and said in a voice devoid of any expression, “Maria Lewis, also known as Maria Reynolds, also known as Maria Clingman, also known as Mary Clement …”

“Wow, how do you keep that all straight?” Danny inquired.

“… you are under arrest for illegal trespass. Samuel Seabury, you are under arrest for illegal trespass. You have the right to remain silent …” He went through the Miranda warning, and Sam Seabury immediately demanded his phone so he could call his attorney.

*          *          *          *          *

Delphine was sitting next to the baby’s crib reading a book. She looked up and smiled when Peggy and Gil walked in. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away for the whole evening.”

Peggy realized that Delphine had no idea that anything had happened. She gave her a quick briefing, minimizing her concern as much as possible. “So will you go upstairs and tell John or Eliza that we’ll be there shortly? I’m sure they’re handling things, but I want them to know where we are.”

“Of course,” Delphine said, her face clouded with concern. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yeah, I’m okay now. A little shaken, but that will pass.” Baby Daniel stirred and whimpered in his sleep. “When did he have a bottle?”

Delphine looked at her phone, where she made careful notes of everything. “It’s been more than three hours. He might be waking up to eat again.”

Peggy smiled. “That would be good, actually. I’m a little uncomfortable.”

Delphine gave her an understanding nod, and, as if on cue, Daniel let out a wail as Delphine closed the door behind her. Peggy turned to Gil. “ _Chéri,_ will you unzip my dress?”

Gil did as she asked, then said. “I’ll change him. You sit down.” He changed the baby in short order and handed him to Peggy. She had removed her bra completely and spread a blanket over her lap to protect her dress. She took her son from his father and put him to her breast totally unselfconsciously.

Gil sat in the chair across from her, struggling with his emotions, although little of that showed on his face. First and above all, the sight of Peggy feeding their baby overwhelmed him with love, as it always had. She was as breathtakingly beautiful as she had been when she was seventeen, when she put her whole trust in him despite what others, including her sisters, thought. Since then they had fought hunger and cold and other kinds of deprivation, and they had fought armed enemies. In all that time, he had known real fear only twice: first, when Peggy lay next to John on a blood-soaked table, willing to risk her life to save him, and second, when Maria Lewis had told him she knew who Katie was. _I know what she looks like,_ Maria had said. _I could find her._

He thought about that now, his eyes on Peggy. Her hair had fallen down a bit, and a curl lay against her cheek as she looked down at the baby. He thought about how vulnerable they were, all of them. The gun in the downstairs gun safe was useless. Even if he carried a gun at all times, as he had twenty years ago, even knowing he’d always been able to hit any target from any distance, how realistic was it to think he would be able to protect all of them at any given time? Even now, Peggy and Daniel were here, while the other six children were upstairs. On a weekday, they were scattered in four or five different places. It was John who had told him long ago that there were no safe places; John, who had grown up in constant fear for himself and his brothers and sisters, understood that. John was grateful every minute because he knew that things could change without warning. It was Alex who had put it into words, though: _Nothing is promised, not one day._

He crossed the room and sat down next to his wife, brushed the fallen curl back and tucked it behind her ear. She turned to smile at him, and he felt his heart contract. _“Je t’aime à la folie,”_ he said softly.

Her face was serious. “I know,” she whispered. She twisted her fingers in his hair and pulled him down to kiss him. The kiss took a long time, and when they finally separated, she looked into his face and saw the darkness behind his eyes. “We’re all right,” she told him. “Everybody is safe.”

She was the only one who saw him cry.

*          *          *          *          *

“Please can I have my brother with me?” Polly asked, her voice not quite steady.

Agent George Davies turned and looked at his superior officer. “Captain Conway, sir?”

“Her brother is Colonel Laurens,” the captain said drily. “It’s not a problem.” Tom Conway himself might not want there to be any deviation from usual protocol, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew that the President considered the whole Hamilton/Laurens/Schuyler/Motier clan as family.

Davies left the room and came back shortly with John. He gave Polly a brief, tight hug. “It’s okay,” he told her. “There’s no way you could have known.”

“I’ve never heard of Maria Lewis,” Polly said to her brother.

John motioned to the two Secret Service agents. “They just want to ask you some questions.”

“Okay,” Polly agreed.

“I’ll be right here,” John assured her, but stepped back so it wouldn’t look like he was trying to interfere. He wasn’t worried about the questions Polly would be asked. If the Secret Service background check hadn’t found out that Mary Clement was Maria Lewis, nobody could expect a twenty-year-old college student to know.

“She wasn’t actually a student in my class,” Polly was saying. “She was monitoring it. It’s an undergraduate class.”

“You didn’t think that was odd?” Conway asked.

Polly shook her head. “No, not really. She hadn’t been able to fit it in when she was an undergrad, she said. It happens sometimes. You know, by the time you take all the required classes, you don’t have a chance to take other ones that you might want. There’s just not enough time.”

“How well did you get to know her?”

“Not very well, really.” Polly shifted uncomfortably in her chair and glanced over at John. “Sometimes there are people who want to hang out with me or Katie because our families are, like, famous. It can be annoying, but we try not to be mean.” She hesitated for a minute. “Katie calls them fangirls or fanboys, and I guess that’s what they are, but we’re used to it. When Mary – Maria, I mean – asked a lot of questions about my family, it wasn’t a red flag because it happens all the time.”

Conway nodded. It made sense. God knows, he’d seen this girl and Katie Schuyler-Motier both on TV when they showed the audience for the Kennedy Center Awards, and once or twice a year in _People_ magazine. Easy enough for Maria Lewis, or whatever her name was now, to seek them out.

“Okay,” he said. “I don’t think there’s anything else we want to ask you now.”

Polly managed a smile. “Thanks. If you need me, the officer took my number, and I live here during the semester.”

Nice kid, Conway thought. “Thank you. We’ve got your information.”

Polly went directly to her brother. “Any chance I can have some champagne?” she asked, knowing perfectly well what the answer would be.

“Nope,” John responded, as she had known he would, “How about a cup of tea and a large serving of chocolate mousse?”

“That actually sounds better than champagne.”

*          *          *          *          *

“What are you going to do with them?” Danny asked Ben much later, after Gil had given a gracious speech about how much he appreciated everyone’s patience while the “problem” was resolved, after most of the guests had departed, after the caterers had cleared out and some hasty rearranging of bedrooms and inflation of air mattresses been taken care of, and a dozen of them were gathered in the living room downstairs.

“Seabury, probably not much,” Ben said. “He’s an idiot, but I doubt if he’s guilty of anything else. Maria, though, we’ll have to do some intensive investigation.”

“You said she’s been living in England?” Danny asked.

“Yeah, for at least ten years.”

“Do you know what she was doing there?”

“Not yet. It looks like she may have gone to college there. She must have had some sort of transcript to present to Penn. She also claims she married a guy named Jacob Clingman. Her story is that they’re divorced, but we can’t find a record of either the marriage or the divorce. She says that she started going by Clement because people always mispronounced Clingman.”

“That’s farfetched, even for her,” Alex commented.

“That’s what I thought,” Ben agreed. “Anyway, we’ve got a lot to track down.”

“You should talk to John and Abbie,” Danny said.

“Adams?” Ben asked, surprised. “Why?”

Danny shrugged. “If she was into, you know, anything political, they might know. They’ve still got a lot of connections in England, especially the Oxford area. That’s where most of the stuff was going on.”

Ben nodded thoughtfully. “You think that might be what she was doing?”

“Well, from what I’ve heard about her, she’s always had an eye for the main chance. She could have been recruited in England, and then she might have come here to see if she could ingratiate herself.”

Alex looked furious. “You seriously think she might have … what? Become our friend?”

“No, of course not,” Danny responded quickly. “I know that would never be a possibility. The thing is …” He hesitated.

“What?” Alex asked.

“Maybe she thinks she knows you better than she does. Or maybe she’s got some other plans that we can’t even guess at. I just hope Ben can keep her locked up until we know for sure.”

“Me too,” Ben agreed.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maria Lewis Reynolds married a Jacob Clingman (one of Reynolds’s “associates”) after her divorce from Reynolds, moved to England, then returned to the US using the name Maria Clement. While she doesn’t seem to have ever been divorced from Clingman, she later married a Dr. Mathew and, according to reports, became a very respectable woman and a pillar of the Methodist Church. Personally, I have my doubts.  
> Colonel Thomas Conway was a member of the 6th Pennsylvania under the command of General Anthony Wayne. Conway was known for his strict discipline and his adherence to regulations.  
> George Davies was a member of the Pennsylvania militia.  
> How long do you think Ben can keep Maria locked up?  
> I am, as always, grateful for kudos and comments. Thank you!


	4. Even Now I Lie Awake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Katie wants John to tell her who Maria Lewis is. Ben and Danny have something in common. Maria thinks she has some information that will upset Alex.

“How had I never even heard her name?” Katie asked. “I thought I knew what went on with the family during the insurrection. What else haven’t you guys told me?”

She’d grabbed John first thing in the morning and pulled him into the library. Angelica and JB had already left for New York, and Burr and Teddie had taken a taxi to the airport. Alex was on the phone, and she didn't know where everybody else was.

She knew John wouldn’t lie to her.

He was staring out the window across the green lawn. _So much,_ he could have said. _There are so many things we never told you..._

He had grown up in a family that presented a false front to the world. Outsiders had seen Henry and Eleanor Laurens as a wealthy, elegant couple, and on the occasions when their five children appeared with them in public, they were well-dressed, well-behaved, and well-mannered. There was enough money that anything that didn’t fit that flawless image could be kept quiet. No one knew that inside the home, Eleanor spent most days in bed under the influence of the prescription drugs she was addicted to, or that the children went in constant fear of Henry’s vicious temper. No one ever found out that John’s frequent hospital visits had nothing to do with clumsiness or bicycle accidents. Even John himself hadn’t learned until years later that the last thing that took him to the ER had cost Henry Laurens a small fortune in bribes to cover it up.

His own kids, like Katie, knew that his mother had died when he was fifteen, that he and his father didn’t get along, and that his father had been killed in the Second Insurrection. Should he have told them more? Would it help anyone to relate the brutal details of the countless beatings he’d received at his father’s hands? The broken bones? The fractured skull and concussion that had nearly killed him? Only Alex and Eliza knew everything.

Would it be better for Katie to know that Gil had been a sniper, shooting King’s Greaters from rooftops? That he might be responsible for more deaths than anyone else in the Movement, even though he had saved countless other lives with his medical skill?

He turned back to Katie. “You know all the important things.”

She raised a skeptical eyebrow and for a moment looked so much like Eliza that his heart hurt. “So you’re saying that Maria Lewis wasn’t important?”

He sighed. “No, she was. She … it’s not all mine to tell, Katie.”

“Then whose?” She sniffed and he saw that her eyes were bright with tears. “You’ve never lied to me, Uncle John.”

“And I’m not lying now, I swear. There are things … you were so little during the insurrection. We all did everything we could to protect you. Maybe we’re still doing that now.”

“I’m grown,” she said softly.

“All right.” He thought for a minute. “I’ll start with something else, but stay with me.”

“Okay.”

“You’ve heard the story about the night AJ was born, right?”

That brought a smile to her face. “When Mom went into labor at the Inaugural Ball? Yeah, we all know that one. AJ thinks it makes him important.”

“Well, because of that grand finale to the Inaugural Ball, you probably haven’t heard about other things that happened that night?”

“You mean like the EMT saying Dad and Aunt Eliza couldn’t go in the ambulance with Mom, and you yelling for General Marion so they could?”

John smiled at that. Frank Marion was always the guy who could get things done. “That’s part of the same story.”

“Yeah, Mom says you would have gone right to the President if you had to.”

“Damn straight. Frank handled it though. What else do you know?”

“Mom’s dress was ruined. It was her bridesmaid maternity dress that Uncle Herc made, and she had to throw it out. I think she was really upset about that.”

John smiled. “She was, but she got past it. What else do you know about that night?”

Katie looked puzzled. “Nothing really. Was there more?”

“Yeah.”

“Something else that nobody ever told me about?”

“Probably. There are things … it’s not that we ever decided to keep things from you, Katie, but once the Insurrections were over and we had free elections, we just didn’t want to talk about the painful things.”

“Like you don’t talk about the times you were shot?”

“Not unless I have to.”

“Marcy told me once that you nearly died.”

“Yeah.” _But I didn’t._ He took a breath. “Even now, Katie, there are things that it’s very hard to talk about.”

“Really? Even after all this time?”

 _She’s only nineteen. Thank God, she’s never been hit by the kind of tragedy we all knew. Yes, she lost her parents, but she was a baby then, and she doesn’t remember._ He started again. “Do you know that the night of that Inaugural Ball was the first time your mom met Danny? She’d never even heard of him.”

“What? I thought he was with all of you in New York.”

“He was, but that was when Peggy was still in Albany. Gil got Danny out of the country in the spring. It was October when Philip and Catherine were arrested.”

“But how could she not even have heard of him?”

“Do you know who Nat Hale was?” He wasn’t quite changing the subject.

“I think so. He was Martine’s first husband, right? Gabriel’s biological father? He died in the Insurrection.”

“You’re mostly right, although he died a week before their wedding date.”

Katie let out a little gasp, and her eyes filled again. “That’s so sad.”

“Yeah.” It was as clear in his mind as if it had happened yesterday. “Angelica was going to be maid of honor. But Nat was killed, and there was a warrant out for Patty – sorry, Martine – so we hid her, first in Eliza and Angelica’s dorm room, and then at Tim’s church. You know Tim, don’t you?”

“The chaplain? Yeah, a little.”

“He was the pastor of Saint Dismas, and he was also Danny’s guardian. They lived in an apartment in the church, and Angelica got Patty there – look, I’m going to keep calling her Patty because that was her name then.”

“Okay.”

“Then Gil got a French passport blank from the embassy, and Danny and I forged a passport for her. Angelica cut her hair and dyed it blond, and she went to France with Madame Gérard.”

“To Chavaniac?”

“Yeah. We didn’t hear from her for a long time.” He stopped and thought about how much to tell Katie. The details of Nat’s death were brutal. She was watching him, waiting for him to go on. “Katie, about Nat … he wasn’t just shot in a battle like I was a couple of times. He was captured, held prisoner, and tortured. He didn’t … he didn’t die quickly.”

She swallowed hard, her eyes still on his face. “What …?”

He shook his head. “I’m not going to tell you.” He reached over and took her hand. “Herc knew. Herc and Ben and Nat’s brother Billy. They went to Massachusetts to bring Nat’s body home, and they’re the only ones who saw. Then Herc came back to New York and told Alex and me. Alex told the General. Nobody else.”

Katie was crying outright, her hands clutched tightly in her lap. “That’s why you don’t tell us everything.”

“We fought that fight so that you and Polly and all the kids born since then would never see what we saw, never have to make the hard decisions that we had to make. Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad we did what we did, because things are better now, but going back to those memories takes its toll.”

“There’s a lot more bad stuff, isn’t there?”

“Yeah. That time, from Nat’s death on, for more than a year, it was really bad. That’s when the whole Movement went underground. Nat died in November, right before Thanksgiving, and nothing ever went back to what we would have called normal after that. The fighting got worse and more people died. Danny was arrested for a murder he didn’t commit.  The Greaters came to our campus and dragged some of our friends out of class in handcuffs.” He stopped, and there was a long silence.

“Uncle John, do you know how my parents died? Mom said they were shot trying to escape.”

He nodded slowly. “That’s the story that was released. Your parents were well-known, so they had to say something.”

“But you don’t know?”

“I’m sorry, Katie. Alex and TJ tried to find out more, but that’s all the information we ever got. It might even be true.”

She thought about it. She had no memories of her parents, gone before she was a year old. There were portraits of them in the front hall. John had painted them from photographs that Peggy had in her locket, and from his own memory of them. She loved the pictures, her father with a charming twinkle in his eye, her mother with a beautiful smile, but they weren’t real people to her. “I feel like I ought to miss them more,” she whispered now.

“Don’t,” John said gently. “You were only a baby.”

“I’ve just always felt like Peggy and Gil are my parents.”

“They are, in every real way.” He let go of her hand and turned her face toward him with his fingertip. “The night they met …”

Katie gave a tearful little laugh and rolled her eyes. “I know, I know, love at first sight.”

“But not just them,” John told her. “You too. You were always part of it. Peggy and Angelica and Eliza were crying, and Gil just picked you up and took you off to change you, and when you came back, you were giggling and playing with his hair. I don’t think Gil had ever even held a baby before, but you were his by then. You and Peggy both.”

“So it was as magical as they say it was?”

John smiled. “I’m just telling you what I saw. They were both committed to taking care of you.”

She smiled back. “They always did. When I was little, I didn’t really know what a family was, I just knew there were all these grownups that were mine. You all loved me. You all listened to me.”

“And look how well you’ve turned out.”

“Apparently being raised by a community of revolutionaries is good for kids,” she said. “We’re all okay, and really, this family is so complicated, there are always extra parents around.” Her face grew serious again. “Polly doesn’t remember your parents very well either.”

“My mom died right after Polly was born. My dad – it’s probably better if she doesn’t remember.”

Without knowing all the details, Katie was aware that John’s father had been abusive, and that he and John were estranged long before Henry’s death. She nodded. “That’s what Marcy says.”

Marcy remembered a lot. She’d been fourteen when their father was killed.

John took a breath and stared out the window again. The lawn was still green and velvety, and the leaves of the big oak tree were just beginning to turn gold along their edges. There were so many beautiful things now – the oak tree and the big stone house they were in, and the girl sitting across from him. He didn’t like to look back. _The past is past,_ he had said over and over, and after all these years, much of the darkness had receded far enough that he barely thought of it. God damn Maria Lewis for dragging it all back.

He turned back to Katie. “When I say there are things I’m not going to tell you, it’s as much about me as it is about you. I’ve spent half my life …” His voice got tight, and he had to stop.

Katie left her chair and knelt in front of him, grabbing his hand. “I’m so sorry, Uncle John. I didn’t mean to make things hard for you.”

“It’s okay, Katie-boo,” he said, and she started to cry. “I just want you to know that there I things I’m not going to talk about.”

“I understand,” she told him, sniffing and looking around for a tissue.

She didn’t, he knew, but it was all right. He didn’t want her to have to understand cruelty and torture and violent death.

She found a tissue and blew her nose, and he took both her hands in his. “Don’t be afraid to ask me things. I’ll be honest with you. I’ll tell you if I’m withholding anything, like right now. I’m not going to tell you everything about Maria Lewis. I’ll tell you that she was a really bad person during the Insurrections. She was on King’s side. The last time I saw her or heard anything about her was the last night of the Second Insurrection. She was mixed up with some other people who were all killed in the fighting, and I’d assumed that she was dead too. That’s all I’m going to say about her.”

Katie nodded, accepting it. Maybe someday she’d know, but John and her parents had a right to keep things to themselves. There were things she didn’t tell people, either. She moved on to a different subject. “So how come Danny and Martine never moved back to New York?”

“Maybe they like living in a castle.”

“Now you’re joking.”

“Yes, I am. You know Danny’s a professor, right?”

“Yeah, he teaches political science.”

John nodded. “By the time President Akhdir was elected, Martine was pregnant with Francie, and they decided to stay in France with Gabriel and the new baby, and then Danny was offered the teaching job, and it just worked out that way. They travel back and forth a lot, just like you do.”

“I think I was four the first time we went to Chavaniac. I remember swimming in the pool with Gabriel. We’re the same age, and AJ and Francie are the same age, so it’s always seemed like they’re our cousins. And I remember that they had three grandmothers, Granny Franny, Grandma Betty, and Nana Liz.”

“Patty’s mother, Danny’s mother, and Nat Hale’s mother.”

Katie smiled. “When I was little, I was jealous that the Félice kids had three grandmothers and I didn’t have any. They were really nice to all of us, though, whenever we ended up there at the same time. Granny Franny used to take us out for ice cream. I was, what, twelve, when she died? I don’t remember Grandma Betty as well.”

“She died not long after Francie was born.”

“Yeah. I’m glad they still have Nana Liz. They’re going to go see her before they go back to France.”

“Good. She deserves to have happy times with her grandchildren.”

“Because of Nat dying?”

“And other things.”

Katie didn’t pursue it. She was quiet for a minute, and then she said, “I love you so much, Uncle John. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“I love you too, and I’m here for you whenever you need me.”

“I know.” She sniffed again and took a deep breath. “Maybe I should take a break. We’ve talked about a lot, and I don’t think we’re anywhere near Maria Lewis yet.”

John smiled. “You’re right. And I think I should tell your mom and dad that I’m telling you about this stuff.”

“Will they be mad at you?”

“Not mad, no, but maybe … we all wish we didn’t have to remember it.”

She stood up and gave him a long hug. “You’re the best person I know.”

“I love you, Katie-boo.”

*          *          *          *          *

“Is there any more coffee?” Gil asked. He’d been out early for a run and had just taken a shower and come downstairs to the kitchen where Ben and Danny were drinking coffee. Danny waved in the direction of the party-size coffee pot that someone had had the good sense to bring down from the ballroom. “Ah, of course.” He got a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. “Where’s Alex?”

“On the phone with Tony,” Ben told him. “They’re going over some speech. Alex thinks he should be in the office to review it, but I’m making him stay here. He claims it will be my fault if something awful happens to soybean production because I ruined the speech. He’s mad at me.”

Gil smiled faintly. “You don’t seem concerned.”

“It’s just Alex being Alex.”

“And feeling guilty,” Danny added.

“Guilty about what?” Gil asked.

“About Maria or Mary or whatever her name is. Did you know they had a thing once, back in college?’

Gil took a long gulp of coffee. “Oh, yes.”

“It was before I knew him. Ben has been filling me in.”

“It was Nat who talked sense into him,” Ben said. “Alex damn near threw everything away when he got mixed up with her. She was, let’s say, a negative influence.”

“She was much worse than that,” Gil said. “She was a thief and a murderer. Perhaps you can explain to me why she is not in prison.”

Ben understood that it was personal to Gil. He spread out his hands.  “No evidence. She committed her crimes during the Second Insurrection, when the only offenses that were prosecuted were political ones.”

“She was mixed up with the Shippens,” Gil reminded him.

“I know, but again, I can’t arrest her for being friends with Sadie Shippen.” He pushed his hair off his forehead and Gil suddenly saw how tired he was, with dark circles under his eyes.

“Did you sleep at all?”

“A little. I hadn’t actually planned on spending the night …”

“Ben, I’m sorry. I was too distracted last night. Do you have everything you need?”

Ben smiled. “You haven’t noticed that I’m wearing your clothes?”

Since it was jeans and a rather faded Penn sweatshirt, Gil really hadn’t paid any attention. Now he looked Ben up and down. “Oh, so you are. Did Peggy ....?”

Ben shook his head. “John. He even knows where the extra toothbrushes are kept.”

Of course.

“Just in case anyone had forgotten that John Laurens is literally a saint,” Danny put in.

“Just keep believing that,” John said from the doorway. “Oh, thank God, there’s coffee.” He looked around. “Food?”

Danny pointed at the counter. “There’s like twenty dozen donuts and five kinds of coffee cake. Marcy and Malik went out early.”

John helped himself to coffee and a couple of donuts and sat down with them. “Is Alex still on the phone arguing with Crazy Tony about beans?”

“Yeah,” Ben nodded. “We can’t do anything until he’s done, and the soybean situation is dire in some way that I can’t possibly understand.”

“Alex takes all that shit seriously,” John told him through a mouthful of glazed donut. He swallowed and asked curiously, “Where are the kids?”

“I need to use the kitchen as a conference room,” Ben said, “so Eliza and Peggy have organized a Disney movie marathon with sugary snacks in the upstairs playroom.”

“Oh, great,” John responded. “I can’t tell you how I’m looking forward to driving all the way home with three sugar-hyped kids.”

Ben exchanged looks with Danny. “About that …”

“What?”

“You may be here for a while yet. We think Maria may have worked with some fringe factions in England, and Danny and I want to interview her about it.”

John’s eyebrows went up. “Danny? Why would he interview her?”

“Go ahead,” Ben said to Danny, as both John and Gil stared at him.

Danny got up and poured himself another cup of coffee. “You know I teach Principles of Democracy and related courses at the University of Lyon, right?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s not all I do.”

“Can you explain that to us?” Gil asked.

“Not in any detail, really,” Danny responded apologetically, “but I do sort of the same thing Ben does.”

John took another gulp of coffee and looked at Gil. “We’re in a nest of fucking spies.”

“There are only two of them,” Gil said thoughtfully. “We could take them down.”

“Not until I’ve had another donut.”

“And you couldn’t anyway,” Danny declared.

John raised an eyebrow. “Is that a challenge?”

“Fuck, yeah.”

“Okay, knock it off,” Ben said sharply. “I mean, you two can beat the shit out of each other later if you want, but first we have to interrogate Maria Lewis.”

“What’s holding you up?” John asked.

“We had to negotiate an arrangement. Maria says she will talk to us honestly, but first she has to be allowed to talk to Alex.”

“Great. I guess we’re all waiting for the soybean issues to be resolved.”

Ben and Danny exchanged looks again.

“That’s part of it,” Danny conceded. “The other part is that Alex says he won’t talk to her alone. He wants you with him.”

John stared into his coffee cup. “Shit,” he said.

*          *          *          *          *

“They don’t want me to talk to you,” Maria complained, looking up at Alex from under her lashes. Some things never changed.

He had no idea what she had to say, but Ben Tallmadge was curious about Maria Lewis’s past and her possible connections with questionable elements in England.

He shifted impatiently in his chair. “So talk.”

She looked straight at him now. “I went to college, you know.”

Did she think this was going to be some sort of catching up with an old friend conversation? “Okay,” he responded expressionlessly, turning the pen in his hand. He glanced over at John, who was just looking bored, but John’s presence had been part of the deal.

“You didn’t think I’d make it to college, did you?” she asked.

“Oh, for the love of God, Maria, I don’t care if you went to college. What do you want, applause?”

“You thought I was stupid.”

She was wrong on that. There were a lot of things he’d called her, but stupid wasn’t one of them. He sighed. “You went through all kinds of trouble to be able to talk to me. I’m not here so we can review the last fifteen years. You said you had something important to tell me. What is it?”

Maria tossed her hair back – really, wasn’t she a little old for that? – and nodded toward John. “I don’t want him here,” she said.

John kept his eyes on her, but he didn’t say anything.

Alex shook his head. “John stays.”

“I told them I wanted to talk to you privately.”

“You’re not making the rules, Maria.”

“I don’t think you’ll want him to hear what I have to say,” she said.

“I have no secrets from John.”

A tiny smile curled the ends of her mouth. “I bet you do.”

What the hell was she talking about? “No,” he told her. “I don’t.” He thought back over the last twenty years. There had been things he tried to hide from John back at the beginning, just as there had been things John kept from him, but now? Now there was nothing. John and Eliza knew everything.

“If he stays, I won’t tell you what I know,” Maria said, her topaz eyes narrowing. “There’s no reason I can’t go directly to the newspapers.”

“The _newspapers?_ ” Alex repeated, astonished. “Are you saying there’s something the newspapers don’t already know about me?”

“Oh, it’s not about _you_ , Alex.” She tilted her head and smiled at him. “It’s about your pretty wife.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Has John made the right decision in not telling Katie everything about the Insurrections? Katie's an adult. Should he and the others continue to protect her from the hard facts? What in the world can Maria know about Eliza that she thinks the newspapers might want? Is it possible Maria has reformed?  
> And the really important question: Can John still take Danny down?  
> Let me know what you think!


	5. When I Was Young and Dreamed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John tries to persuade Maria to back off. Everyone speculates about what information she might have. AJ makes a big announcement at dinner.

Alex stood stock still, staring at her. After a few seconds, he found his voice. “Oh, fuck you,” he snapped and turned on his heel. “Come on, John.”

John stood up, but made no move to leave the room. “You go,” he said to Alex. “I’ll talk to her.”

“Don’t waste your time,” Alex started, but John waved him off.

“Go find Ben,” John said, his eyes on Maria. “Tell him what she said.”

Alex hesitated for a minute, but did as John told him, shutting the door behind him.

John crossed the room to stand in front of Maria, his elbow propped casually on the mantel. “You want to tell me what you think you know about Eliza?” he asked, his voice soft as silk.

Maria did her hair-tossing thing again. “No, I don’t,” she retorted. She looked him up and down and gave that little smile. “Too bad you’re gay.”

John said nothing, just waited.

“Why are you even here? This isn’t any of your business.”

“You might be surprised what my business is,” John told her. “You might have to deal with me, and if not me, then Ben Tallmadge. We won’t be as easy on you as Alex.”

“Alex isn’t easy,” she said sulkily.

“Oh, you have no idea.” John’s voice was still soft, his South Carolina accent unusually noticeable. “You should ask somebody who knows both of us.”

She ran her tongue over her lips and said, “You don’t scare me.”

John leaned down until his face was inches from hers. “I could kill you without leaving a mark,” he whispered, “and bury you where they’d never find you.”

Her eyes widened, but she held her ground. “Fuck you.”

John placed his right hand on her shoulder and slid it up until his thumb was on her carotid artery. His left hand on her other shoulder held her in place. As he applied pressure, her vision began to blur and she gasped, “Stop!” What was he doing?

He didn’t stop, and the room swirled around her as she tried to get her breath, and then he suddenly withdrew his thumb, smiling. “Believe me now?” he asked. His hands were still on her shoulders holding her in place.

“Let go of me!” she yelled, struggling to pull away. “Get away from me!”

John heard the door latch and took a quick step back, and Ben Tallmadge entered the room.

Maria jumped up and ran to him, grabbing the front of his shirt. “Get him out of here,” she begged. “He tried to kill me.”

John was back in front of the fireplace, his arm resting on the mantel again. When Ben turned to look at him, he saw nothing but blank bewilderment on John’s face. “What happened?” Ben asked, detaching Maria’s hands from his shirt and taking a step back.

“Nothing,” John told him. “I was asking her questions, and when she heard somebody coming she started yelling.”

“He’s lying!” Maria screamed. “He tried to strangle me!”

“Ben, you can’t think I would …”

“Strangle her?” Ben queried, looking closely at Maria’s neck. “You look okay to me, ma’am.”

Maria was pale, and there were tears running down her face. “He said Alex would be too easy on me, so he was going to kill me, or maybe you would. You’d both cover for Alex.”

Ben raised a skeptical eyebrow. “He said that?”

“Yes!”

John spread his hands, palms up and rolled his eyes. “She’s quite a performer, isn’t she? Very realistic. I saw her do it nearly twenty years ago. Ask Herc or Angelica. They were there too.”

Ben nodded. He’d been on the phone with Angelica earlier. “All right. Come back upstairs. We need to talk to Alex and Danny about some things. As for you, Ms. Clement, or whatever your name is, stay in this room. There’s an officer outside the door who will stop you if you try to leave.” He walked out, leaving the door open.

John waited a minute, then took a few steps and leaned down to whisper in Maria’s ear. “Told you I wouldn’t leave a mark.”

*          *          *          *          *

Peggy wasn’t exactly angry, but she was beginning to be a more than a little irritated about the way Ben Tallmadge seemed to have taken over her house.

“What’s wrong with the police station?” she asked Eliza rhetorically after Ben had told her that no one was allowed in the library. “Why are they keeping that woman here?”

“I don’t know any more than you do, but Ben wouldn’t do it without a good reason,” Eliza told her.

Peggy had never really known Ben Tallmadge. By the time she got to New York after the First Insurrection, Ben was at Headquarters working closely with the General. Of course she’d met him later, but now he worked in the Capital, and he kept a very low profile. She knew Ben and Gil had been good friends, but she still didn’t see any reason for him to tell her what to do in her own home.

Now Gil, Alex, John, and Danny were shut in the safe room with Ben, having some sort of conference, while she, Eliza, and Martine made tea in the kitchen. Marcy and Malik had organized a day at the Philadelphia Zoo for all the children, and had insisted that Katie, Polly, and Gabriel go along to help with the younger ones. The only one still at home was little Daniel, who was on Peggy’s lap now, looking around the kitchen with interest.

Martine poured herself another cup of tea. “It does feel a bit like the women and children have been banished from the real conversation.”

“Exactly!” Peggy agreed.

“They don’t mean it that way,” Eliza said. “They have to do their strategy thing.”

“Okay, I get that Ben and Alex, and I guess Danny have to handle that, but there is no reason in the world for John and Gil to be in that meeting.”

Eliza shrugged uncomfortably.

“What?” Peggy asked her suspiciously, her eyes narrowing.

“They would have some information about Maria and also about Sam Seabury. They knew both of them.”

“Sam Seabury,” Peggy muttered. “I should have realized.”

“Realized what?”

Peggy rubbed her forehead. “I kept going over the party plans, and there was something that was bothering me. I thought I’d forgotten something, but it was the name Samuel Seabury on the guest list. Mary Clement didn’t ring any bells, but I know I’ve heard of Sam Seabury, I just didn’t make the connection. If I had, maybe none of this would have happened.”

“Don’t worry about it now,” Eliza told her. “Did you ever even meet Sam Seabury?”

“No, but I should have recognized his name. Didn’t he write for a newspaper in Philadelphia or something?”

“Yeah, but not for long. After that, I never heard of him again until last night, and I’m sure Alex and John didn’t either. They would have told me. Even if you had reported his name, Alex says his record came up clean. It’s Maria they’re investigating. She was involved with some seriously bad people during the Second Insurrection.”

Peggy nodded. “I know she was, but I don’t know all of it.” She thought back, Maria lying on the floor, bleeding, John and Alex pulling Gil away. “She said Gil tried to kill her,” she went on, her voice tentative.

Eliza reached for her hand. “Yeah.”

“Did he?”

“I wasn’t in the room.”

“I know, I was with you,” Peggy reminded her. “Did Alex or John ever tell you what happened?”

Eliza bit her lip. There was no point in trying to protect Peggy now, eighteen years after the fact. “Alex said it could have been true. If he and John hadn’t been right there – well, it doesn’t really matter, does it? We could go crazy speculating on all the things that might have happened.”

“The past is past,” Martine reminded them. “Isn’t that what John always says?”

“Yeah,” Peggy nodded.

“It was a war,” Martine went on. “We all did things we would never think of doing under ordinary circumstances.”

“I wasn’t … they designated me as a noncombatant because of Katie. I didn’t go on Missions. I didn’t learn to shoot until near the end. I was going to be the only adult in the house with all the kids, so John taught me to shoot. He said I’d be the last line of defense to protect the kids.”

“And you would have shot anybody who tried to get near them,” Eliza pointed out.

“Of course.”

“Then don’t be too hard on Gil.”

“I wouldn’t, it’s just … none of us ever knew everything.”

“Only what we needed to know,” Martine reminded her gently.

Peggy thought back to when Gil was away for days at a time, to when John came home with unexplained stitches in his forehead, to when Angelica was furious about something that she couldn’t discuss. “Do you think we’ll ever know all of it?” she asked.

Eliza shook her head slowly. “No. And I think it’s better that way.”

*          *          *          *          *

Alex was on his fourth cup of coffee. “She admitted that she saw Burr, and so she knew where Desi was. Her boyfriend told Jimmy Prevost, and Jimmy killed Desi. We’ve known that for years.”

“Right,” Ben agreed, his voice sounding tired. “But you can’t prosecute somebody for a death in combat.”

“It wasn’t a combat death,” Alex said bitterly. “It was an ambush.”

“Let it go,” Ben told him. “We could never prove it, even if we got the okay to go ahead.”

John got up and poured himself a cup of tea. “I think it was Maria and Jay who killed Grammy Nell.”

Ben and Danny had no idea what he was talking about, but Alex and Gil snapped to attention.

“Tell us,” Gil ordered.

“I’m not positive,” John cautioned, “but Maria talked about selling a diamond necklace that she had. She didn’t say where she got it, but we know she didn’t come by it honestly. And remember the day Maria and Jay showed up at Grammy Nell’s house with a teapot or something to sell? Angelica saw them. That means they knew she was fencing stolen goods.” Sweet and innocent-looking Grammy Nell, seventy years old, had been their go-to black market dealer until the day Alex and Gil found her dead on her kitchen floor.

“Anything else?” Ben asked.

“No,” John admitted, “just that Jay Reynolds, at least, wouldn’t have hesitated.”

Gil looked at Alex. _“C’est logique.”_

Alex shrugged. “But there’s no evidence, and Jay Reynolds is long dead.”

“I know,” John said. “I’m just saying that Maria had her fingers on a lot, even if Reynolds was the leader. How soon after the end of the Insurrection did she marry this Clingman guy?”

“It doesn’t look like she actually married him,” Danny responded, “but they showed up in England almost right away. You remember that Meg and Ben Arnold moved to London right after the election.” Benedict Arnold had opposed General Zain Akhdir in the Presidential election. When he lost, he and his wife left the country to live in England. “Maria started hanging around the edge of their circle not long after that.”

John nodded. “Makes sense. Maria was friends with Meg’s sister Sadie.”

“What happened to Sadie?” Danny asked.

“She was killed the same night as Desi, along with her boyfriend Jimmy Prevost, who was Desi’s ex,” Alex told him. “Maria’s boyfriend was killed not long after that, along with Judge Shippen, Meg and Sadie’s father.”

“The Judge supported King?”

“He supported whoever could give him an advantage,” Gil said bitterly. “He had no principles and no morals.”

Danny blinked, but didn’t ask any questions. “Okay, so with everybody else out of the way, it looks like Maria followed the Arnolds to London.”

“She was always very, very good at adapting to other people’s moods or styles,” Alex said softly. “She’s a chameleon.”

“That would be useful,” Ben pointed out. He turned to Danny. “So were the Arnolds mixed up with the Plumier supporters in England?”

Danny moved his hands up and down to indicate balancing on a scale. “Maybe. Once Ben Arnold died, though, and Meg hooked up with André Johns again, definitely. Johns was a good speaker, used to talk at all the meetings of the ‘England for the English’ or whatever the hell they called themselves.”

“KKK?” John suggested helpfully.

“Yeah, basically, but with a different accent and no pointy hoods.”

Alex shifted in his chair and pushed his hair off his forehead. “Look, this stuff is interesting and all, but figuring out what shit Maria was involved in ten years ago doesn’t tell us why she turned up here and now.”

“Money,” Gil said succinctly. “That’s always been her motivation.”

Ben nodded. “When you dated her in college, Alex, wasn’t she trying to get money out of you?” He pretended he didn’t hear John’s snort when he said the word _dated_.

“Yeah, but of course I didn’t have any,” Alex said. “She was taking pictures and video even back then, building herself a blackmail file.”

John and Gil already knew about that, but it came as a surprise to Ben and Danny. “Really?” Ben asked, raising an eyebrow.

John glanced at Alex, who nodded. “Go ahead.”

“She sent me video,” John said. “I think she was still working out the best strategies for blackmail, or maybe she was just pissed off at Alex and sent it for revenge, but the fact that she had taken it was pretty … surprising.”

“Video of Alex and her?” Ben asked.

“Yeah.”

“Wowser,” Danny commented succintly.

“I’d be willing to bet that she’s got pictures to sell now,” Gil said. “She talked about going to the newspapers, right? She has a story she wants to sell them, and she wants Alex to outbid the newspapers.”

“And she’d have to have pictures or something to prove her story, is that what you mean?” Danny asked.

_“Exactement.”_

“But she said it was about _Eliza,_ ” Alex said, shoving his chair back and standing up. “Eliza! There just isn’t anything Eliza has ever done that has to be kept hidden.”

“Maybe she just said that to get you interested,” Ben suggested. “Maybe she thought you’d pay attention if you thought she had something on Eliza.”

Alex shrugged doubtfully. “It’s possible, I guess.” He went to the counter, poured himself another cup of coffee, and stirred sugar into it.

“That’s five,” John said.

“Fuck off,” Alex told him calmly as he sat back down. John had been trying to limit his caffeine intake for twenty years, with little success.

Ben got out his phone and scrolled through his messages impatiently. He had things to do. “All right,” he said, “let’s assume for the moment that Maria has a story, maybe about Eliza, maybe about someone else, that she wants to sell, and she’s got some sort of evidence to back up the story – pictures, video, maybe an affidavit from somebody or something like that. I’m not going to ask you or Angelica or Jack Sullivan or anybody else if you’ve got skeletons in your closet, because I’m positive we all do. Give it some thought, though. Is there anything you can think of that could be a big enough issue that somebody would blackmail you for it now, years after it happened? Obviously, I don’t mean anything that was part of military action. All our Missions were cleared by Headquarters, and we were fighting to restore our legitimate government.”

“Then what?” Gil asked.

Ben thought for a minute. “Okay, in your case, Gil, there were times when you stole medications from clinics or hospitals so you could treat our wounded. That’s not what I mean. Technically, that was commandeering medical supplies, and armies do that when they have to. But let’s suppose you had kept some of the drugs you stole and sold them to make money for yourself. That would be a whole different situation ethically. Not that you would do that, of course …”

Gil nodded. “I understand what you mean. It would have to be something not part of our responsibilities to the Movement.”

“Right.” Ben knew he was on very thin ice here. The General had ordered assassinations of certain of King’s supporters who might otherwise have led strong factions to rally for King and oppose the Movement. As far as he knew, only the General – now the former President – Zain Akhdir knew who had carried those out. It didn’t seem possible that Maria could have information on any of those, and even less likely that she would invoke Eliza’s name if that were the case, but he’d have to keep an open mind. He looked around. “If you’ve got anything you want to tell me, feel free to speak up.”

He couldn’t imagine that anyone in this room had acted dishonorably during the Insurrections or since. They’d all committed sabotage, blown up bridges and buildings, stolen supplies and killed King’s supporters, especially the militarized police force known as the Greaters, but if Maria brought a story like that to the media, they’d laugh at her. Alex, John, and Gil were still hailed as heroes of the Insurrections; Danny hadn’t even been in the country for the Second Insurrection, and as for himself, he’d spent most of his time at Headquarters, working on codes and communications. It didn’t make sense.

There was an uncomfortable silence in the room, and it occurred to Ben that he might be wrong. Maybe he didn’t know everyone as well as he thought he did.

It was John who spoke up. “Why don’t you give us a little time, and if we figure anything out, we can contact you.”

“How much time?” He wasn’t inclined to hang around Philadelphia much longer.

John glanced at Alex, but Alex was studying his fingernails intently. “Twenty-four hours?”

Ben thought about it. “I’m going to have to hang onto Maria somehow, but Roger will help with that. I’ll take her downtown now.” He looked from one impassive face to another around the room, wondering what secrets, if any, might be concealed. “If nobody gets back to me within twenty-four hours, we tell Maria to go ahead and give her story to the papers, right?”

There were a couple of brief nods, and John said, “Okay.”

Ben waited another few seconds and then left the room. There was an almost audible sigh of relief, and then Gil stood up. “Let’s go,” he said. “Let’s have some lunch and act like normal people. Enough of this drama.”

*          *          *          *          *

“Marcy is a saint,” Katie said, taking another spoonful of her water ice. “I guarantee you, Malik has been carrying Sky around all day.”

Gabriel laughed. “Probably. You have to admit, we got the easy job.”

Once they arrived at the zoo, Marcy had efficiently divided the children up into groups; Katie and Gabriel were in charge of the older ones, who were now in the gift shop buying tee shirts and key chains, while the two of them relaxed on a bench for a few minutes. Polly had taken Angie, Libby, and Marlie with her to go see the exotic birds, and Marcy and Malik had the three youngest.

Katie shook her head, making her curls bounce. “Ten kids. We brought ten kids here today.”

“Not counting us, right?”

That made her laugh. “No, we are legal adults.”

“Well, thank God for that,” he said. He bent and kissed her, and she kissed him back. “Your mouth is cold.”

She held up her cup of water ice. “You want some?” She offered him a spoonful, but he shook his head, so she ate it herself.

He leaned in and kissed her again. “Lemony.”

She laughed. “You can go get another one.”

“I like this better.”

She was still smiling, but she glanced over her shoulder.

“Katie, we’re going to have to tell them.” He was trying to be patient, but she could hear the exasperation in his voice.

“Yeah, I know.”

It had started more than a year ago, when the Motier family spent more than a month of the summer at Chavaniac. Katie and Gabriel had known each other almost their whole lives and had always been friends, but something had changed during those weeks. They’d taken long walks around the castle grounds and had driven down to Avignon to see the Roman ruins, and nobody had paid much attention because they’d always spent time together, and the castle was full of kids and old friends. It was easy to keep a low profile. _Let’s see where it goes,_ Katie had said, not wanting to deal with a lot of parental questions. Polly was the only person she’d confided in.

Gabriel, who knew exactly where it was going if he had anything to say about it, had reluctantly agreed. They’d kept up with phone calls and facetime and Gabriel had managed a quick visit over Christmas break. He hated the secrecy, though, and could see no reason to conceal their relationship.

“What are you most worried about, that everybody will tell us we’re too young, or that they will be overcome with the cuteness of the whole thing?”

She laughed again. Nobody had ever made her laugh the way Gabri did, and that was one of the reasons she loved him. “We are cute,” she agreed, and he tugged on one of her curls, then dropped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer to him. She took a deep breath. “Right here, right now?”

“Why not? If the kids come out of the gift shop and find us making out, then _they_ can tell the family and we don’t have to figure out how to do it.”

“That’s a pretty smart solution,” she agreed, leaning in for another kiss.

They didn’t even notice anybody else around them until they heard AJ say, “Holy shit.”

Pip, Francie, and Timo were right behind him.

 _“Vraiment, Gabri?”_ Francie demanded. _“Depuis quand?”_

 _“Depuis l’été dernier,”_ her brother told her.

_“Et tout en cachette? Pourquoi?”_

_“Parce qu’on voulait pas supporter les questions des petites soeurs.”_

_“Méchant!”_

“Do Mom and Dad know?” AJ asked.

“Not yet,” Katie responded cautiously.

AJ grinned. “Cool! I can tell everybody at dinner.”

Katie looked at Gabriel, who smiled and said, “That’s the plan.”

She grabbed both his hands. “Promise to sit next to me.”

*          *          *          *          *

Ben had left the house to hand Maria over to Roger Stayner, at least temporarily, and as much as they all liked and respected him, there was a sense of relief around the lunch table. Peggy had declared that they were to eat all the birthday party leftovers for lunch, so there was a sort of disorganized buffet of cold roast beef, chicken wings, various side dishes and salads, and birthday cake. Fatou and Oumar had the day off after working the previous day for the party, so Peggy pulled out paper plates and napkins, and John made sure there were serving spoons and forks.

“How do you know where everything is in my kitchen better than I do?” Peggy asked.

John gave her his most charming smile. “I’ve actually cooked in this kitchen, Sis. Have you?”

Peggy smacked him with the first thing she could grab, which fortunately was a dish towel, and Alex told them to behave themselves.

“You standing in for Angelica since she’s not here?” John asked.

“As a matter of fact,” Alex said, “we should call Angelica right now.”

Eliza looked up, frowning. “Why?”

Alex called Angelica on facetime and propped his phone up on the table so she could participate in the conversation. He waited till they’d all filled their plates and sat down before he explained what Maria had claimed and what Ben wanted from them. “And since I know it’s absolutely ridiculous to allege that Eliza ever did anything that we could be blackmailed for, I think we’ll be rid of Maria very soon.”

Only Danny was astute enough to catch the quick glance that flashed between Eliza and John. He had some things to think about himself, though.

Peggy was nursing the baby, so Gil made her a sandwich that she could hold in her free hand. “The whole thing is outrageous,” she said. “I mean, of all people, _Eliza?_ ”

“Thank you,” her sister responded.

“Well, you’re like that person, you know, whoever it was, ‘above reproach.’”

“Caesar’s wife,” Danny supplied.

“Yeah,” Peggy nodded. “Her. She was so upright and moral nobody could even criticize her, right?”

“Not exactly,” Danny told her. “Caesar said that when he divorced her because there had been rumors about her, and he wouldn’t stay married to someone who was even suspected of wrongdoing.”

Peggy’s jaw dropped. “Well, shit,” she said, “that’s not what I meant at all.”

“But are you sure that Maria’s information, if it actually exists, is about Eliza?” Angelica asked, interrupting the conversation.

Alex shrugged. “That’s what she said.”

“Yeah,” Angelica responded, “we probably shouldn’t take her at her word. My guess is that’s her way of making sure you pay attention. I mean, if she said she had something on Gil, nobody would bother with her.”

“Thanks,” Gil said drily.

“Oh, you know what I mean,” Angelica went on. “Everybody knew you were up on a roof with a gun almost every night.”

Gil said nothing, giving his full attention to his lunch. Peggy looked at him, her face serious, but he didn’t meet her eyes.

“That’s not what she meant, though, is it?” Martine asked. “Wouldn’t that be part of the Insurrection itself?”

There was a brief silence, and then Gil looked up and smiled at her. “That would depend on what I was shooting at.”

She saw something flicker in his eyes that she hadn’t known was there, and it made her feel suddenly cold. She’d known Gil since she was seventeen, but maybe she didn’t know him as well as she thought. She laughed with the others as if Gil had been joking, but they knew he wasn’t. She chewed her salad thoughtfully and swallowed it, then took a sip of ice tea. How many of them had secrets still buried years after the Insurrections? Were they all concealing things that they couldn’t or wouldn’t disclose? Alex had been in charge, so he almost certainly knew things that he had never divulged. She looked around the table. John? Maybe. Everybody loved John, but he had spent years hiding his dark and violent past. He was good at keeping secrets. Angelica? It was possible. She’d been near the top of the command structure, so she, like Alex, would have had access to confidential information. Peggy? No, Peggy had been a noncombatant, taking care of Katie, and later all the other children. She hadn’t even carried a gun until the very end of the Second Insurrection. Eliza? Oh, surely not. Whatever Maria Lewis might say, nobody could seriously believe that Eliza Schuyler was guilty of anything illegal or immoral. Danny? She looked up at him, and he smiled the same smile that she’d known for years. It was true that there were times when he’d been away, when he said he couldn’t tell her things because she didn’t need to know, but if anybody was firmly grounded in integrity, it was Danny Phoenix. He’d practically been raised by Tim Dwight, who’d gone on to become the Commander of the Army Corps of Chaplains. Danny thought everything through and looked at it from all angles before he made a move. Danny might have secrets, but he wasn’t hiding anything that would bring disgrace to himself or his family. She mentally brushed all the negative thoughts away, and got up to get some more tea. “Shall I cut some slices of cake while I’m up?” she asked.

*          *          *          *          *

The kids came home in time for dinner, and suddenly the house was filled with the noise of voices and the clatter of feet running up and down the stairs. Sky and Joey were impatient to tell their parents about every single animal they’d seen, AJ and Pip started an energetic discussion about what they wanted on the pizza that was about to be ordered for dinner, and Angie, Libby, and Marlie showed off the parrot earrings they’d bought. Katie had brought back a shirt with a giraffe on it for baby Daniel, and Peggy decided he should wear it for dinner.

“Are we still using paper plates?” Eliza asked as Peggy started up the stairs.

“Yes, and we’re eating in the kitchen.”

“Mommy, we saw lions and tigers …” Lauren said as she followed Eliza into the kitchen.

“And bears?” Alex asked, coming up behind her and picking her up.

“No,” she giggled, “but those animals like lions, but they’re black?”

“Panthers?”

“Yes, lions and tigers and panthers.”

“Did you have fun?” Alex asked.

Lauren nodded enthusiastically, her curls bouncing. “Oh, yes. We saw, like, a thousand animals, and we had ice cream.”

“That sounds like a very good day.”

“Next time, you should come, Daddy, you and Mommy and Papi.”

“That’s a good idea. We should make a plan.”

Francie and Timo came into the kitchen just then, and Timo announced unenthusiastically, “Our mom said we should help.”

Eliza laughed at his glum face. “There’s really nothing to do here, but I’d appreciate it if you go up to the kitchen by the ballroom and see if there are any more cans of soda that need to be brought down. Take AJ and Pip with you.”

As they left, Eliza asked Alex, “Could you and John or Malik bring the big folding tables in from the garage? Peggy wants to eat in the kitchen.” While the entire family could fit around the enormous oak dining table that Gil had had custom made, a less formal meal required at least two tables. Within a short time, Alex and John had set up the folding tables and chairs, and the doorbell indicated that the pizza had arrived. Gil and Danny brought in the stacked boxes, and, as usual, a general uproar ensued as every box had to be opened so that all the varieties of pizza were easily available. Finally they were seated, adults at the round table and all the kids except baby Daniel at the two folding tables. Polly, Gabriel, and Katie were counted among the adults now, and Polly smiled as she watched Angie and AJ cutting up slices of pizza for Joey and Sky. “Remember when that was our job?” she said to Katie.

“Oh, for sure. We were the big kids, so we had to help the little kids. We never got to just enjoy our dinner.”

Peggy and Marcy exchanged a look, and Marcy cleared her throat rather loudly. “Really? Some of us remember when you two were the little kids, and Peggy and I were cutting up your food.”

Katie blushed. “Got us,” she admitted. “I guess everybody gets a turn.”

“If I recall correctly,” Gabriel said to Katie, “weren’t you the one who upended a whole plate of _boeuf bourguignon_ onto yourself and the floor the first time you were at Chavaniac?”

 _“Gabri, arrête!”_ she protested. _“Tu n’es pas gentil!”_

“Fortunately the floors at Chavaniac are all solid stone, so no harm done,” Martine laughed.

Katie’s face was still red, and she was looking up at Gabriel, half laughing, half exasperated. He grinned and tugged at one of her curls, and Peggy, across the table, suddenly saw exactly what was going on. She grabbed for Gil’s hand under the table, and he smiled at her.

 _“Tu es au courant?”_ he asked.

 _“Juste à l’instant.”_ She was trying not to be obvious. “How long, do you think?” she whispered to Gil.

“Oh, a while. Before Christmas, certainly.”

“You’ve known since _Christmas?_ When were you going to tell me?”

He was still smiling that infuriating smile. “It’s not mine to tell, _chérie.”_

“Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette,” Peggy began, and all at once, everybody was paying attention.

“Uh-oh,” John said.

“Oh, all the names,” Eliza added. “This isn’t good.”

Gil didn’t let his wife get any farther, laughing and cutting her off with a kiss. It was effective, as it had always been, and he whispered in her ear, “We will talk about it later” before he pulled away.

Peggy took a deep breath and reminded herself that nobody wanted a big dramatic scene less than she did, but she would definitely have some things to say to Gil later.

They were just starting to clear the tables when AJ surprised almost everybody by standing on a chair and yelling, “Ladies and gentlemen, I would like your attention. Pip, Francie, Timo, come over here in case I need witnesses.”

The other three stood around him, looking a little uncomfortable, and Katie, seated between Gabriel and Polly, was holding both their hands tightly under the table. Gil looked at his oldest son with some curiosity and asked, _“Tu dois en faire un drame en cinq actes?”_

 _“Oui, absolument,”_ AJ told him.

“What’s going on?” Alex asked.

Gil threw up his hands. “Apparently my son wants to make some sort of announcement, and he is being as dramatic as possible.” He gave Peggy a sideways look under his lashes and added, “These dramatic tendencies do not come from my side of the family.”

“ _Excuse_ me,” Eliza protested.

Peggy dug her nails into her husband’s thigh under the table. “Oh, you will pay for this later,” she whispered.

“Willingly,” he replied, licking his lips.

Peggy blushed bright red, and Alex said, “Nothing ever changes around here.”

Somebody had given AJ a large spoon, and he banged it against the back of the chair he was standing on. “Hey, I have an announcement that I’ve been asked to make on behalf of my big sister Katie.” Everyone turned to look at Katie who was, if possible, even redder than Peggy. “She’s in love,” AJ went on. “She’s in love with Gabriel Félice, who _fortunately_ is not actually our cousin. She didn’t want to tell everybody, so she said I could.” He waved his spoon with a flourish and jumped off the chair.

Gabriel didn’t look at all embarrassed, and as it turned out, AJ’s big surprise announcement had not really surprised many people.

“We’re not stupid,” Danny said, ruffling Gabriel’s blond hair. “You came over here for Christmas and spent the whole time in Philadelphia, didn’t even visit New York. And all those facetime calls – it didn’t require Sherlock Holmes.”

“I just knew it would be kind of a big deal in the family,” Katie was saying to John, sniffling a little. She’d never kept a secret from John in her life. He hugged her. “It’s okay, Katie-boo. You’re allowed to have some privacy.”

A few minutes later, Katie pulled Peggy aside. “Are you okay with it?” she asked.

“Of course. We already love Gabriel, you know that.”

“I just worry, you know, if things don’t work out, it’ll be awkward.”

Peggy nodded. “For a while, but it will be all right.”

Katie glanced over to where Gabriel was talking to Alex, both of them laughing. “He’s cute, isn’t he?”

“Very cute,” Peggy agreed, her mind going back to what it was like to be young and in love.

“You’re not going to tell me I’m too young?”

“Katie, you know that when I was your age, I was married and pregnant with AJ. I am absolutely sure that you can fall in love young, and it can be the real thing. I can’t say if that’s the case with you and Gabriel, but I certainly can’t rule it out.”

“It feels real,” Katie said softly. “It feels so real.”

*          *          *          *          *

“Don’t you dare ever say again that your side of the family isn’t dramatic,” Peggy told him, still breathing hard, lying naked under him, her curls spread out across the pillow.

“You think that was dramatic?” he asked.

“I think that was a very impressive performance.” She raised her head and nipped at his bottom lip, and he kissed her, sliding his hand into her hair and holding her head in place.

 _“Oh, ma belle, mon coeur,”_ he murmured, kissing his way down her throat. _“La plus belle du monde …”_ He rolled to his side and pulled her with him, their legs tangled together. “Damn, I have to go to work tomorrow.” It was late.

“But you’ll be home tomorrow night,” she reminded him, running her nails lightly down his back.

“Every night,” he agreed. “Every night forever.”

She curled against him. “How did you know about Katie and Gabriel?” she asked sleepily.

“Ah.” He hesitated for a moment. “I saw him coming out of her bedroom at five o’clock in the morning.”

_“Really?”_

 “Yes, you remember, I had an emergency call a couple of days after Christmas?”

“Yeah.”

“As it happened, we both walked into the hall at the same moment.”

She couldn’t help but giggle. “That must have been awkward.”

“It was. I said something about having to get to the hospital, and I went on my way. I think he was relieved I didn’t try to have a conversation.”

“And you didn’t say anything later?”

 _“Chérie,_ what would I say? They’re not babies, and we trust Katie to make careful decisions. Besides, I like him.”

“I do too. I hope it works out for them.” She was quiet for so long that he thought she’d fallen asleep, and then she said, “Gil, _chéri_ , we were so lucky. Nothing had to work out for us. It just happened, and there we were.”

_“Comme un coup de foudre.”_

_“Oui, exactement. Je t’aime, chéri.”_

_“Je t’aime aussi.”_ He kissed her hair and held her close.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everybody has secrets. Which one does Maria know? By the way, the secret she wants to use for blackmail is something that occurred in either I Like You a Lot or Provoke Outrage. I won't tell you which one, but if you've read them, you might well be able to figure it out. It's a legitimate secret that only 3 people know, and it would definitely mean big trouble if it got out. 
> 
> Raise your hand if you saw the Katie and Gabriel romance coming. I think they're cute.  
> It looks like Gil and Peggy are still doing what they've always done. I wonder if there will be another baby added to the family.
> 
> Thanks to everyone for reading and for kudos and comments. I love to hear what you think.


	6. Damn, It’s Getting Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliza finally tells Alex about something that happened nineteen years ago. Even John has never heard the whole story. Someone else is involved, and the consequences could be very serious. John has to explain to Peggy, Gil, and Danny that he can't tell them anything. The concept of "need to know" is back, and nobody's happy about it.

Alex, John, and Eliza always got the biggest guest room at Gil and Peggy’s, the one with the pale cream walls and the king-sized bed and, of course, its own bathroom. It was only seven in the morning, but Alex was already up and dressed and downstairs on a conference call with Tony and somebody from the Department of Agriculture.

“I fucking hate soybeans,” he had muttered on his way out.

John stood in the doorway to the bathroom, watching Eliza blow her hair dry. She had just taken a shower and was naked in front of the mirror, blow-dryer in one hand and hairbrush in the other. She still took his breath away.

She caught his eye in the mirror and smiled, and he thought for the millionth time how beautiful she was and how lucky he was that she loved him. Not a day went by that he wasn’t grateful for her and Alex and for the relationship that had once seemed completely impossible. He waited while she finished and got dressed, and then he said, reluctantly, “We need to talk about it.”

She bit her lip and a shadow crossed her face. “Now?”

“Yeah.” He took both her hands and pulled her over to the window seat. He gave her a few minutes, gazing out the window at the empty terrace. It had been misty earlier, but the sun was coming out, and it was going to be a beautiful day. Eliza remained silent, so he finally spoke. “We should tell Alex first.”

She was looking down at her hands, but she nodded, and then he heard the sob that she was trying to suppress.

“Oh, Eliza, sweetheart, it’ll be all right.” He put his arms around her and pulled her close, and she cried outright, her face against his shoulder as he held her, stroking her hair and her back and hoping that he wasn’t lying to her.

She gulped and reached across him to get a tissue from the box on the table. “Maybe not, John. Maybe it’s going to be really bad.”

“We were in the middle of a war,” he said. “We all did things that are almost unimaginable now.”

“We were breaking Danny out of jail. It wasn’t a battle like Times Square or the Wissahickon.”

“It was still a battle. Danny was a political prisoner. It was like … like the Bastille.”

She choked halfway between a sob and a laugh. “I don’t really think that’s a great analogy.”

He kissed her forehead and then her mouth. “Let’s not borrow trouble, sweetheart. One thing at a time.”

“Alex won’t understand why I never told him.”

“Yeah, he will. He’ll understand because there were things I never told him, things I never told anybody.”

“But you did eventually,” she reminded him.

“Only because Frank confronted me with it all. If he hadn’t found out, I’d still be hiding it.”

She was silent for a minute, then, “Do you think everything would be different if you’d never told Alex and me what happened to you?”

“I know I’d be different,” John told her. “I’d still be scared of everything, still be having anxiety attacks.”

“I don’t have anxiety attacks. I hardly ever even think about it, and when I do, I don’t feel guilty.”

“I wouldn’t either. Look, maybe we’re guessing wrong. Maybe that’s not what Maria is talking about.”

Eliza managed the ghost of a smile. “That would be good. There’s nothing else, though.”

“Nothing except Maria’s lies.”

“Here’s hoping that’s all we’re going to have to deal with.” She took a deep breath. “Alex first, and then Ben?”

“Let’s see what Alex says.”

Of course. They made decisions together.

*          *          *          *          *

Alex was finally off the phone, drinking coffee in the kitchen with Danny and Martine. Gil had gone to work, and Ben was doing something downtown with Roger Stayner. The older Motier kids had gone to school, protesting loudly, and Peggy had taken Sky to her regular dance lesson.

John poured a cup of coffee and helped himself to one of the blueberry muffins Fatou had made for breakfast. Eliza put on the kettle. “Anybody else want tea or just me?” she asked. There was no response, so she stood patiently waiting for the water to boil while Alex told them all more about soybeans, subsidies and agricultural exports than they wanted to know.

“So it manages to maintain the earnings of our soybean farmers in spite of the competition from China,” he finished with satisfaction.

“Hm,” Danny commented with a total lack of interest.

“Tony’s damn good on agriculture,” Alex added.

“He’s well-respected in France,” Danny responded, hoping they were done with the soybean saga.

“Of course he is,” Alex declared. “Thank God we’ve had two Presidents now who understand the Constitution.”

The kettle whistled, and Eliza made her tea and brought it to the table.

“Muffin?” John asked, picking up the plate.

She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

He gave her a minute to drink a little tea, and then he said, “Alex, Eliza and I need to talk to you. You want to come with us to the library?”

Danny stood up immediately, “Don’t bother moving, we were just getting ready to go. We’re taking the kids to the Art Museum. All of them, yours too. Katie’s going with us.”

John grinned. “How about Katie and Gabriel, huh?”

“We’re getting old, guys,” Alex put in.

“True,” Martine agreed. “Gabri is almost exactly the same age I was when he was born. None of us have any standing to tell them they’re too young.”

“We had to grow up fast,” Alex said, glancing at Danny, who coolly ignored him. “Maybe it’s a little different now.”

John shook his head. “It’s not. It’s like Gil says, we love who we love, and if we find love, we should take it.”

Martine closed her eyes, her throat suddenly tight. “I remember the night he told me that,” she said softly. Danny put his hand on her shoulder, and she looked up at him. “I didn’t believe him then, but he was right. At least he was right about all of us.”

Her husband gave her a brief, affectionate kiss and said, “Let’s get going. Pip and Timo are dying to see the suits of armor.”

“Great,” Martine commented as they left the kitchen. “Why don’t you take them to look at those, and the rest of us can enjoy the Impressionists?”

Alex stared after them. “Who would have thought?” he asked rhetorically.

“Pretty much everybody,” John told him, rolling his eyes.

“Oh, fine. Let me get some more coffee and then you can tell me whatever you want to tell me. It’s not about Pip talking back to his history teacher again, is it?”

“No,” Eliza assured him as he got his coffee. “I think we may have convinced Pip that he still has some things to learn from his teacher. It’s something important this time, Alex.”

Alex turned around, a frown creasing his forehead. “The kids are all right, aren’t they?”

“The kids are fine,” John responded. “Well, Pip’s a smartass, but he’s in middle school, so what can you expect?”

Alex had nothing to say, because they all knew that Pip was exactly like him, and there was a moment of silence. John looked at Eliza and gave her an encouraging smile.

“I think I know what Maria Lewis is talking about,” Eliza said, her voice steady.

Alex snapped to attention. “What? What do you mean?” He looked from Eliza to John, and his heart sank. Whatever it was, it was serious, and they both knew about it. He reached out both hands across the table, and they each took one. “Tell me,” he said quietly.

Eliza started. She went back to that awful spring nineteen years ago when everything was coming apart. It was the last semester they were in college, and she and Angelica were still sharing a dorm room, but Angelica wasn’t there the night it began. Sylvia Johnson had come knocking on the door in tears. Sylvia’s boyfriend was missing, and she was hoping Eliza could help.

Marty Middicks, the boyfriend in question, was one of those annoying guys that people tolerate, but never really like. He’d started out on the wrong side of things as a supporter of King, but he’d come to realize he was wrong. He joined the Movement, but he made so many stupid mistakes that Alex lost patience with him. Danny had gotten into a fight with Marty over his friendship with Nick Mattice, an old high school buddy and a Greater. Marty couldn’t understand that it was a problem. That wasn’t his biggest mistake, though. Marty’s last mistake cost a lot of lives, including his own.

It was Eliza who went with Sylvia to the police station, Eliza who stood up to the Greaters and volunteered to identify Marty’s body herself because Sylvia was too distraught to do it. It was Eliza, and only Eliza, who saw what they’d done to him. She had given Alex only the briefest description, and never talked about it to anyone again. To anyone except John.

John took up the story now. Danny had been arrested for Marty’s murder, the earlier fight used as evidence against him. It took every bit of Alex’s skill with words to persuade the General that they should break into the prison to rescue Danny. Ten of them went in, executing a meticulous plan of distraction and surprise, and they got him out. The next day he was on his way to France. Danny wasn’t the only one who had to disappear after the prison attack; Tim Dwight and Jacob Turck went to Headquarters, Tim to head the new Corps of Chaplains, Jacob to train the Movement in munitions. It was when Alex left to take them there that Eliza told John what had happened.

“You know there was a firefight at the distraction point,” Eliza said now, picking up the narrative again. “When we first went in, a lot of Greaters came down the hall at us – maybe fifteen, twenty of them. Tony sent Jack and Molly through the broken wall to come up behind them, and we had them at both ends then with no place to go. Some were dead by then, of course, and some were injured, but we had them all covered, and Jacob was zip-tying them. Herc and Jack and Molly were down at the other end, and Tony was behind me.” She stopped and swallowed hard. “One of the Greaters had been shot in the leg and he was yelling at us. He was already cuffed, and he wasn’t hurt badly at all, so Tony told him to shut up. He didn’t. I moved in closer, and that’s when I saw his name tag. It was Nick Mattice.”

Alex felt the bottom fall out of his stomach. They all knew Nick had been responsible for luring Marty to his death. “What happened then?” he asked.

“I killed him,” Eliza said simply. “I shot him in the forehead.”

Alex nodded, taking it in. “He was already cuffed?”

“Yeah. And wounded. He wasn’t a threat in any way.”

Alex nodded again, waiting.

“I saw what they did to Marty,” Eliza said, her voice so low Alex had to lean in to hear her. “The only thing I told you was that they had burned him with cigarettes, but there was more. I told John some of it.”

“They tore out his fingernails,” John told Alex, “and I know there were things Eliza didn’t tell me.”

Eliza took a deep breath. Tears were running down her face. “I don’t want to remember it,” she whispered.

John got up, pushed her chair against Alex’s, then pushed his own chair in so that she was between them, clutching their hands. John put his arm around her and looked at Alex over her head. Alex’s face was bleak, and his eyes were filled with tears.

Eliza let go of John’s hand long enough to grab a crumpled napkin off the table and wipe her eyes. “His face,” she said, doing her best to control her voice. “I mean, I knew it was Marty, his hair, his build, it had to be him, but I swore I recognized him, and I didn’t. Nobody could have. He … his face was … it was smashed. His … his nose, his cheekbones … it was all flat …” her voice broke, and she started choking, and John, reacting fast, grabbed the wastebasket and held it for her as Alex held her hair back and she vomited into it, sobbing. When the paroxysms finally stopped, John got a wet washcloth and handed it to Alex. Alex gently wiped Eliza’s face as John disposed of the wastebasket contents and then brought her a glass of cold water.

“Drink some water,” he said softly, and she did, but she was still crying.

“You don’t have to talk anymore,” Alex told her. “You don’t have to think about it anymore.”

“But I do, Alex,” Eliza protested, her voice shaking with anguish. “I killed a wounded prisoner. He was handcuffed. I killed him for revenge, not because he was a danger to any of us. It’s a war crime under any definition.”

 _Revenge for poor, hapless Marty Middicks, not for any hero of the Insurrection,_ Alex thought. But that was Eliza, always the defender of the weak and unfortunate. That’s what had compelled her to help Sylvia in the first place. It was her life’s work now as the director of the Philip and Catherine Schuyler Foundation. It was what made them all love her. “But, even if that was wrong – and honestly, I think it’s debatable – how in the world could Maria know anything about that?” he asked now.

“There were other people there,” Eliza responded. “Other Greaters.”

“How would they even know who you were?”

“I don’t know, Alex,” she said wearily, “but God knows our pictures were all over at the end of the Second Insurrection. We rode on a fucking float in the parade, remember? We haven’t been exactly hiding for the last twenty years.”

Alex got up and started pacing. “I still don’t think that’s what Maria is talking about,” he insisted.

John went to stand behind Eliza’s chair and put his hands on her shoulders. “Alex,” he began.

But Alex was still talking. “There’s no way Maria could have heard about it. As far as the other Greaters there, most of them were wounded, there was shooting going on, any identification would be unreliable …”

“Alex,” John said again, a little louder.

Alex glanced at him in irritation and continued. “A lot of Greaters died that day. There’s no way to distinguish which of us shot which one …”

“Fuck it, Alex, shut up,” John snapped.

Alex whirled to glare at him. “Do you honestly think …”

John cut him off. “Alex, pay attention. Did you even listen to Eliza or were you too busy trying to build a cover story?”

Alex flushed. John knew him too well. “We have to think about that.”

John tightened his hands on Eliza’s shoulders and took a breath. “Alex. Listen. Tony was there. He saw it happen.”

Alex went completely silent, and all the color drained out of his face as fast as it had risen. “Oh, shit,” he said and dropped into a chair.

“I’m going to call Ben,” John said.

Alex nodded, wondering if everything they had fought so hard for could come crashing down now.

*          *          *          *          *

All Peggy knew was that something awful was going on, and she and Gil were being shut out of it. When she brought Sky home from her dance lesson, John met her in the kitchen. She knew instantly that something was wrong.

“What?” she asked, her eyes on his face. She hadn’t seen him look that serious in years.

“I need to talk to you,” he told her.

She nodded. “The baby will be hungry. Come upstairs with me. Come on, Sky,” she added, taking her daughter by the hand. “Let’s find Delphine and she can help you with your puzzle.”

John followed her up to the master suite sitting room, where Delphine was sitting with baby Daniel. Peggy handed Sky off to her, saying quietly, “John and I are going to be talking about some things that aren’t for children. Can you do puzzles with Sky and let Katie know if they come back from the museum before we’re done?”

“Of course,” Delphine agreed, concern on her face. She adored the Motier family and hoped sincerely that there was nothing wrong.

Daniel was waking up, so John sat down in one of the soft upholstered chairs and waited for Peggy to change him and settle on the couch with him. She lifted her shirt unselfconsciously and threw a small flannel blanket over her shoulder for courtesy’s sake. As he latched onto her breast, sucking hungrily, she took a deep breath, fully aware of the peace of the moment, the peace and happiness that were her life now. _Please,_ she prayed silently to a God she rarely even thought of, _please let everyone be all right._ She looked at John. “Tell me,” she said.

He leaned forward, his hands clasped between his knees. “Ben’s in the library with Alex and Eliza. We think … Alex and Eliza and I talked, and we think maybe we know what Maria is trying to blackmail us about.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “John, there can’t be anything about Eliza.”

John hesitated, as if he was trying to think of what to say. “Ben doesn’t want us to talk about it with anybody.”

“But … not even us? Or Angelica?”

John shook his head. “Ben’s got the information. He’s handling it.”

“But, John …”

“I know, I know.” He smiled faintly. “It’s need to know only, Sis.”

She didn’t smile back. “I thought we were done with all that.”

“So did I.” He stood up and walked to the window. “Alex has to get back to work.”

“When are you leaving, then?”

“He’s going first thing in the morning.” There was another uncomfortable silence. “Eliza and I would like to stay a little longer, if it’s okay.”

“If it’s _okay?_ What the hell kind of a question is that, John?”

He turned around and crossed to her, knelt down in front of her. “I’m sorry, Peggy, I know better, honest to God.” He leaned his head against her knee and she stroked his curls and tears filled her eyes.

“John, what’s wrong?” she whispered. “I know it’s bad.”

“It may not be,” he told her, his head still down so she couldn’t see his eyes.

She loved John as much as she loved anybody in the world except Gil and her children. He had become the brother she’d never had, and he had been by her side at every important moment for the last two decades. She trusted him implicitly. “Will you ever be able to tell me?” she asked quietly.

He finally looked up. “I don’t know.”

She brushed a curl off his forehead. “Okay. Now listen. You know perfectly well that you and Eliza can stay here as long as you want.” A terrifying thought suddenly came to her mind. “John – it’s not trouble between you and Alex or Eliza and Alex, is it? Are you all still okay with each other?”

He grabbed her hand. “I swear to you, Peg, it’s not that. It’s not anything remotely like that. We love each other almost as much as you love Gil.”

That finally brought the ghost of a smile. “Then whatever else it is, we’ll deal with it.”

“The kids will stay too,” John reminded her. “You know the crazy hours Alex works.”

She nodded. “I figured.” She squeezed his hand. “Can we do anything?”

He shook his head. “Not for now. If there is, I’ll tell you, I promise.” He stood up and kissed her on the cheek.

*          *          *          *          *

Danny and Martine had always planned to stay for a week after the party, but when they returned after a day at the Art Museum, they were a little surprised to find that John and Eliza and the kids were staying longer too. “Ben thinks it might be better if I stay here,” Eliza told them vaguely. “He’s going back to the Capital tomorrow with Alex.”

“And where is Maria Whatsername going?” Danny asked.

Eliza shrugged. “I’m not sure. Ben says he’s taking care of it.”

Danny nodded briefly and went to find John. He found him in the library with Gil, an open bottle of wine on the table between them. “Is there another glass?” he asked.

 _“Bien sûr,”_ Gil responded, gesturing at the wooden doors behind the desk. Danny opened them to find a well-stocked bar complete with a small refrigerator and a sink. He took a glass off the shelf and poured himself some of the Burgundy. It was very good.

“Well,” he said, pulling up a chair, “who’s going to tell me what the fuck’s going on?”

Gil shrugged. “I don’t know. John tells me he can’t talk about it.”

Danny turned to John, his eyebrow up. “Really, John?”

“It’s need to know,” John told him.

That took Danny by surprise. “So there is something.”

John shrugged uncomfortably. “There’s something that might be something. Ben’s working on it.”

“So it’s something in Ben’s wheelhouse?”

John shrugged again. “I don’t even know what that means.”

“Ben’s CIA,” Danny reminded him.

“Yeah, uh … I have no idea. Alex might know what you mean, but …”

“But? Where is Alex, by the way?”

“He’s still talking to Ben, and anyway – don’t ask Alex anything.”

“Why not?”

John rolled his eyes. “Danny, are you seriously asking me why it’s not a good idea to ask Alex Hamilton questions about a need-to-know matter when he’s already enraged about it? Why don’t you just ignore me and go ahead, see what he says?”

Danny smiled. “Okay, I get it. You know it’s frustrating, right?”

“Yeah, sure. Let me just point out that it’s not a lot of fun being me today either. Ben put me on point to tell everybody that we can’t tell them anything. It hasn’t exactly been well-received.”

“How’s Eliza?” Gil asked, not irrelevantly.

“Ah, you know … it’s not a good time.”

Gil raised an eyebrow. “You can’t tell us anything at all, can you?”

“No.”

“You know, I hope, that if there’s anything humanly possible that can be done, we will do it to help you,” Gil told him.

“I know.”

“Me too,” Danny said. “Anything at all.”

John looked at Danny, his mouth a little twisted as he did his best to smile. “You still talk to the angel?”

Danny put his hand on John’s. “Of course I do.”

“Put in a good word for us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Philadelphia Art Museum does in fact have an excellent collection of arms and armor, as well as amazing Impressionist paintings. You'll find me in front of the Van Gogh Sunflowers.  
> Killing an unarmed, wounded, and restrained prisoner of war would certainly be a war crime, but was Nick Mattice a prisoner of war? That definition is very important. Do you think that Maria knows the whole story? Does she know that Crazy Tony, now President Wayne, was there?


	7. What Was It All For?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex and Ben meet with Frank Marion. Someone unexpected shows up. Angelica wants to talk to Eliza.

Ben had an office in Langley, of course, but he had a few other offices here and there as well, most of them in nondescript neighborhoods. The one he and Alex were in now was not very far from the White House, on a street filled with similar-looking buildings and a few stores and cafés. There were doors to other offices along the hallway on the sixth floor where they now found themselves. Alex had the impression of work going on behind those doors, but he didn’t ask Ben about it. He accepted a cup of coffee, and they sat down.

“I called Frank last night,” Ben said. Frank Marion had been Chief of Staff for President Akhdir, and was a national security advisor to President Wayne. He was one of the most respected people in the government, if not the country, and if Alex had to talk to anybody about this, he was glad it would be Frank.

“That’s good,” he said now. “Frank might have some ideas.”

_Alex still doesn’t get it,_ Ben thought. “I want to run it by Frank before we talk to Tony,” Ben went on, and Alex looked up, frowning.

“You don’t think we should talk to Tony yet, do you?”

“Actually, I think we should have talked to Tony yesterday, but I’m getting Frank’s advice first.” Ben leaned forward, his eyes on Alex’s. “Alex, there’s no way Tony’s not going to hear about this.”

“Tony already knows about it,” Alex retorted, a tinge of bitterness in his voice.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe? You think Tony didn’t notice Eliza shooting a guy right in front of him?”

“I don’t know.” Ben took a breath and looked over Alex’s head. “I wasn’t there. You weren’t there. I think Eliza’s recollection is probably accurate, but Jesus, Alex, who knows? There was a firefight going on, and everybody was in danger. That sort of thing can affect memory.”

“The firefight was over by then,” Alex reminded him, wishing it weren’t true.

“That’s how Eliza remembers it.”

“You’re saying it didn’t happen the way she remembers it?”

“I’m saying I don’t know. Just – drink your coffee, and let’s wait for Frank.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Frank Marion arrived alone, as unpretentious as ever. Short, thin, and dark, Frank was the kind of person who easily went unnoticed in a crowd. His hair was a little grayer than it had been twenty years ago, and there were a few more lines in his face, but other than that, he hadn’t changed much. Alex saw him from time to time at work, but they had different responsibilities in different departments, so they rarely spent much time together. Even so, Frank remained one of the people in government that he trusted implicitly. He had always hoped that Frank would choose to run for President at some point, but it didn’t seem likely. He preferred to work behind the scenes.

He poured himself a cup of coffee, obviously familiar with Ben’s office, and took a seat.

“We’ve got twenty minutes with the President at three o’clock,” he said. “Let’s be sure we know exactly what we’re going to say to him.” He turned to Alex. “First things first. Are you certain that the story Maria is trying to blackmail you with is the killing of Nick Mattice?”

“No, I’m not, but that is absolutely the only thing we know of that involves Eliza.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive. Eliza and John and I went over everything.”

Frank sipped his coffee, his eyes on Alex. “Hypothetically, if there were something else, let’s say a more personal issue, how would you react?”

Alex narrowed his eyes. “I don’t think I understand what you mean.”

“If, say, Eliza had been unfaithful to you, would you pay the blackmail or tell Maria to publish and be damned?”

Alex had to think about that. The idea of Eliza cheating had never crossed his mind. “Well, I’d be upset, sure, but I can’t … especially if it was something that happened during the insurrections, any of us could have done anything under the stress. I’d tell her to go sell her story because I don’t think anybody would even care.”

“And if it were going on now?”

“If what were going on now?”

“If you found that Eliza was currently involved with someone else.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Frank sighed. “Hypothetically, Alex.”

Alex tried hard to imagine what it would be like to find that Eliza was with someone else, betraying both him and John. He found himself feeling angry about how much that would hurt John, and how important it was to protect John, because he’d already been hurt enough for ten lifetimes. Finally he shrugged. “I don’t know. But, honestly, I don’t know why you’re even asking about it, because it’s not possible.”

“We ran a check, Frank,” Ben said coolly. “As soon as we knew Maria said she had something on Eliza, we got on it, and there’s nothing. Eliza Schuyler-Hamilton is just as squeaky clean as her husband thinks she is.”

“You ran a _check?”_ Alex asked furiously. “On _Eliza?”_

“Oh, don’t be an idiot, Alex, of course we did. It’s standard procedure, and you know it.”

Frank interrupted Alex as he began to sputter out a response. “And I knew that he had. Use the brain God gave you, Alex. What would you do if this were about anybody else?”

Alex did his best to count to ten, got up and poured himself another cup of coffee to give himself some breathing space. “You’re right, you’re right,” he said when he sat down. “It’s your job. So you already know there’s nothing else that could involve Eliza?”

“Correct,” Frank responded. “The question now is, does Maria Lewis know about Nick Mattice’s death, and, if so, does she know that the President was there at the time?”

Alex shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. How do we find out?”

Frank didn’t answer. He picked up his phone and typed in a brief text. Within a couple of minutes, there was a knock at the office door.

“Come on in,” Ben said.

For a few seconds, Alex didn’t recognize the man who walked in. Then he realized that he’d last seen him when they were breaking Danny out of prison. He was the one who knew how to make explosives, the one who’d mixed the ANFO and had somehow gotten his hands on some C-4 that allowed them to blow the door wide open.

Alex jumped to his feet. “Jacob! Oh, my God!” He stuck out his hand, but Jacob Turck grinned and clapped him on the shoulder, pulling him in for a hug.

“It’s been a while,” Jacob said, still grinning, as they took their seats again.

Alex was astonished. He’d tried to locate Jacob years earlier, but found nothing but dead ends. At least, that’s what it had seemed like. He turned to Ben now. “Have you known where he was all this time?”

Ben shrugged. “Need to know, Alex.”

“Jesus!” Alex glared at him. “I’ve got top-secret clearance, you know.”

Jacob snorted. “We all do. No bragging rights on that.”

“So where have you been for the last couple of decades? Ben told me you’d left Headquarters at the end of the Second Insurrection, and nobody knew where you went.”

Ben raised a finger. “That may not have been true.”

“No shit,” Alex muttered, rolling his eyes.

Frank had given them enough leeway, and he took charge of the conversation again. “Jacob has been working in domestic security,” he said. “He’s one of our top undercover agents.”

“FBI?” Alex asked alertly.

There was a long pause, then Frank said, “You don’t need to know. You do need to know not to call him Jacob outside of this room, though.”

Alex gave Jacob a thoughtful look. “So what’s your name?”

“At the moment, it’s Jago Morgan,” Jacob said, slipping easily into an English West Country accent. “I’m from Truro in Cornwall, over here on business.”

“Jesus!” Alex exclaimed again.

“I talked to Jacob as soon as Ben called me,” Frank continued. “Since he was there at the time of the incident we’ve been discussing, he may be able to give us some information.” He held up his hand. “Alex, don’t say a word.”

Alex nodded. Frank knew what he was doing. “Jacob, about twenty years ago, as the First Insurrection was nearing its end, you were one of the Movement members who broke into the detention center in Elizabeth, New Jersey, to free Danny Phoenix. Can you tell me briefly how that operation was carried out?”

Jacob took a deep breath. He hadn’t forgotten that night. “It was very well-organized,” he said. “Gil Motier was on lead, and there were three actions that had to be perfectly timed. First, our snipers took out all four tower guards simultaneously.”

“Who were the snipers?” Frank asked.

“Gil, John Laurens, Angelica Schuyler, and Tony Wayne. As soon as the guards were down, Eliza Schuyler, Molly Hays, Jack Sullivan, and Herc Mulligan cut through the chain link fence, and I drove a car loaded with ANFO through the opening and right up to the brick wall of the office block of the detention center. I jumped out, we all took cover, and I detonated the ANFO. In the meantime, Tony caught up with us, and John and Gil joined Alex at the visitors’ door. We were the distraction point. They were the ones going in to get to the cell block and free Danny.”

“I’m assuming there was quite a bit of action once you blew out the wall,” Frank commented drily.

Jacob nodded. “Yeah, the Greaters were pretty pissed. There was a firefight in what had been the office area of the building.”

Frank frowned, wanting to be sure he got the details right. “And where was Angelica Schuyler at this point?”

“She stayed in the sniper position, picking off any Greater who got as far as the yard.” Jacob stopped and glanced at Alex, who was biting his lip, his eyes dark. “She was also, I should mention, the designated survivor. If Alex and Gil had both been killed, she would have taken over the squad.”

“All right.” Frank nodded. “Go on.”

“Well, there was a lot of shooting. Tony was in charge of our group, and he split us, sent Molly and Jack through the offices to get behind the guards that were coming at us down the hall. Tony and Eliza were at one end of the hall, Herc and I were sort of in the middle, in a doorway, and Jack and Molly at the far end, if you can visualize that.”

“Yeah, that’s quite clear. Then what happened?”

Jacob looked a little puzzled. “We shot as many of them as we could. Of course, they were shooting too, but we had the advantage of surprise. Also, I think we were better trained.”

Frank gave a faint smile. “You’re probably right.”

“We secured their weapons, and Herc and I cuffed them with zip ties. There wasn’t much else we could do. We could hear shooting upstairs, because Alex, Gil, and John were in the cell block area.”

Alex looked very much as if he wanted to say something, but Frank held up his hand. “Later. I need to hear everything from Jacob first.”

Alex gave a small sigh of frustration, but stayed quiet.

Jacob continued. “Tony left me on guard with the Greaters who were zip tied, and he took everybody else to join up with Alex and the other guys. By then Danny Phoenix and Billy Hale were free and armed, so it only took a few minutes to open up the women’s cell block. They got Fran Manning out and secured all the guards in the cells. Tony yelled for me, and we got out of there.” He shrugged and looked at Frank. “The next day I went to Headquarters, and you know what happened after that.”

“Okay, I want you to go back to the firefight. You said you and Herc Mulligan were zip-tying guards who had been disarmed?”

“Yeah.”

“Were they all disarmed by that point? What I mean is, was there still any shooting going on as you were cuffing the guards?”

Jacob frowned. “It’s not like we did everything in steps, one, two three, so yeah, everything overlapped everything else. It was all very close quarters, and only the emergency power was on, so there wasn’t a lot of light. If we could grab somebody, we did, and zip-tied him so he’d be out of commission.”

“And as you were doing this, shots were being fired?”

There was a brief silence as Jacob thought about it: the smell of gunpowder and blood, the smoke, Tony shouting orders, wounded men yelling – well, a lot of people yelling, cursing, moaning in pain. “There was a lot going on, so if you want me to swear to it, I might not be able to, but yeah, I’m just about positive there were still shots being fired as we started cuffing the Greaters who were still alive. We tried to secure the ones who weren’t hurt first, but a few of them had minor injuries and tried to shoot, so we shot back.”

Frank nodded. “It sounds like things were pretty much as I had expected. Now I’m going to ask you a question that may sound vague, but I can’t be any more specific than I’m being. Did you observe or were you in any way aware of any act that night that could be considered to violate the protocols the General had set up for all Movement members to follow?”

Jacob narrowed his eyes. “Something like stealing from the dead, is that what you mean?”

“I can’t say any more than I’ve said, Jacob, sorry.”

“Then no. There was a firefight, a lot of shooting, a lot of wounded Greaters and some dead ones. We tied the ones who were still alive and left them there.” He stopped and took a breath. “We didn’t provide medical care for their wounded, but our goal was to get in and get out as fast as we could. John got shot that night and Gil barely looked at him until later.”

“But all the wounded were cuffed, is that right?”

“Yeah, as far as I knew, even the ones we thought weren’t going to survive. Better safe than sorry, you know?”

Frank turned to Alex. “Do you know how many fatalities there were that night?”

Alex put out his hands, palms up. “Any number I give you would be a guess. I’d say more than twenty, but we didn’t keep track, and, like Jacob said, we wanted to get out fast.”

“All right,” Frank said. “You’ve given me a good picture of what went on. I have a lunch meeting, so you can take a break now. We’ll meet in my office at the White House at two forty-five. Oh, and Alex, it’s better if you and Jacob aren’t seen together, so if you want to catch up, I suggest you use the cafeteria downstairs. It’s secure.”

Alex looked from Frank to Ben. “What _is_ this building, anyway?”

Ben smiled. “You don’t need to know.”

“Oh, fuck everything,” Alex muttered.

*          *          *          *          *

Angelica showed up unannounced just before lunch on Monday, driving a rental car and looking like she was spoiling for a fight. It was Danny who happened to open the door.

“Who’s here?” she asked, dragging her giant suitcase behind her over the threshold.

“Martine and me and our kids, John and Eliza and their kids, and all the Motiers of course.”

“Where’s Alex?”

“He went back to the Capital with Ben. They’re trying to head off …”

“Son of a bitch!” Angelica snapped.

Danny wasn’t sure if she was referring to Alex, Ben, or himself, so he didn’t say anything.

“I need to see Eliza,” Angelica told him.

“We should talk first,” Danny said.

“I don’t think I should have to listen to …”

Danny held up his hand. “Please. For Eliza’s sake.”

Angelica huffed out an irritated sigh. “All right, fine.” She parked her suitcase in a corner of the foyer and turned back to Danny. “Where?”

“I don’t think anybody’s in the library right now.”

She followed him, and he shut the door behind him and sat down. Angelica followed suit, but stayed on the edge of her chair, ready to get up and leave if she didn’t like what he had to say.

“Nobody’s going to tell you anything,” he began, and held up his hand as she started to interrupt. “There’s no point in telling me that there’s absolutely nothing Eliza could have done that Maria would blackmail her over, because Alex and John have confirmed that there actually is something.”

“Bullshit,” Angelica snapped.

Danny gave her a minute. “Alex and John are not lying.”

Angelica bit her lip and shifted in her chair, settling back a little. “I want to talk to Eliza for myself.”

Danny shrugged. “Fine, but she’s not going to tell you anything.”

“How do you know?”

“Because she hasn’t told Peggy or Gil or me. In fact, if I read everything correctly, she hadn’t told Alex until after the party.”

That got her attention. “What?”

“There was something. Whatever it was, John knew about it, but Alex didn’t.”

“That’s not possible.”

Danny didn’t attempt to argue. “I’m just telling you what I saw.”

“I know Eliza better than I know myself. She’s never kept anything from Alex.”

There was a long silence. Danny knew that contradicting Angelica would get him nowhere. Angelica knew that Danny wasn’t lying to her, but none of it made any sense. “I want to talk to Eliza for myself,” she insisted.

“Sure,” Danny responded, “but she’s feeling pretty stressed now, and whatever this thing is, Ben Tallmadge thinks it’s important enough to take Alex back to the Capital to meet with other people about it. That means that Eliza absolutely can’t discuss it with anybody. Do you really want to ask her to?”

Angelica looked past him out the window. “Who are Alex and Ben talking to?” she asked.

“They didn’t tell me. At a guess, probably Frank Marion, but possibly Tony.”

“President Wayne,” Angelica corrected him sardonically.

“Yeah.”

“So if you’re right, and there is something that Maria can use for blackmail, it goes all the way to the top.”

“That’s the impression I got, but I can’t confirm it.”

“But you know about this kind of shit.”

“Yeah.”

“God, Danny, when did you turn into some sort of James Bond? I liked you better when you were a smartass kid trying to out-talk Alex Hamilton.”

“None of us are who we were twenty years ago.”

“Then why does it matter what Eliza may or may not have done back then?”

Danny shook his head. “I can’t answer that without knowing what happened, and according to John, I don’t need to know.”

She looked at him speculatively. “John won’t even talk to you about it? Really?”

“I’m not lying to you, Angelica.”

“No, I guess you’re not. All right, all right, can I see Eliza now if I promise not to ask her a lot of questions?”

He smiled. “You never needed my permission.”

*          *          *          *          *

Alex poked at his meatloaf with his fork. “Does every government cafeteria in this fucking town serve the same fucking lunch every fucking day?”

Jacob nodded. “Yeah, it’s all contracted out to some gigantic lunch prep conglomeration in Bethesda.”

“That’s not true,” Alex retorted.

“Right.”

Alex chewed some meatloaf thoughtfully. “Am I being an asshole again?”

“Pretty much.”

“God, I’m sorry, Jacob. I don’t see you for a couple of decades, and then when I do, I act like a jerk.”

“The fact that you’re aware of that impresses me with how much you’ve learned over the years.”

Alex smiled reluctantly. “It’s been a rough couple of days.”

“I gathered. I know you can’t tell me why Frank was asking me the details of the night we broke Danny out of jail, but can you tell me if anything I said was helpful?”

Alex thought about it for a few minutes. “I don’t think anything you told him gave him any new information on the subject we’re dealing with.”

“How bad is it, Alex?”

“I don’t know. I’m not even sure we’re asking questions about the right thing. Best case scenario, we’ve guessed wrong, and it’s something else entirely. Worst case scenario – well, that would be bad.”

“Have you talked to everybody else who was there?”

“Ben’s doing the investigation. He’s talked to Eliza, of course, and he called Herc and Jack on secure lines.”

“But not Molly or Tony?”

Molly had been a young widow back then. Now she was the First Lady. That didn’t help.

“We’re going to talk to Tony this afternoon.”

“But not Molly?”

“I don’t know, Jacob.”

“You should call me Jago here,” Jacob said, switching to the English accent again.

Alex snorted. “What the hell kind of a name is Jago?”

“Cornish,” Jacob told him, “and don’t make fun of it.”

“Fine, then, Jago. What do you do these days that you can tell me about without having to kill me?”

Jacob grinned. “I play with my grandkids.”

Alex’s eyes went wide. “Oh, shit. Really?”

“Did you forget how old I was?”

“No, I mean – dammit, yeah. I mean, I know you were older than most of us, and I knew you had kids, but …”

“I’m fifty-three. Noah’s thirty and Janet’s twenty-seven. Noah has a girl, and Janet has two boys. You want to see their pictures?”

“Of course.”

Jacob pulled out his phone, and Alex scrolled through a couple of dozen pictures of three kids playing in the park or on a beach or dressed in Christmas outfits. “Do your kids know what you do?” he asked.

“Oh, hell, no. They think I work for a paint manufacturer with branches in several European cities.”

“Paint?”

Jacob shrugged. “Why not? People use paint everywhere, and every country has safety regulations about what substances are allowed in paint, so if I get delayed in, say, Helsinki, it can be all about lead levels in interior latex paints.”

Alex was impressed. “That’s a really good backstory.”

Jacob raised an eyebrow. “You’re surprised that the people in my department are good at what they do?”

It wasn’t hard to put two and two together. Ben Tallmadge had always been smart. Alex handed Jacob back his phone.

“What about you?” Jacob asked. “Do you have kids?”

Alex nodded, pulling out his own phone. “Three of them. Pip is twelve, Marlie’s nine, and Lauren is six.”

Jacob looked at the family picture, the three kids and their three parents posed happily in front of the Christmas tree. He looked up and smiled at Alex. “I’m glad it all worked out for you.”

“Yeah, it did. I’ve been lucky.”

“We’re all lucky to be alive, lucky to have made it through the Insurrections.” Jacob finished the last of his lunch and put down his fork. “How’s Angelica?” he asked finally.

“She’s good,” Alex responded, keeping his tone light. “I’m sure you see her name on the news from time to time.”

“Oh, yeah, I’ve kept track, you know. The paparazzi have helped.”

“That seems to be a fact of life for some of us. It’s not the best part of being successful.”

“I saw the wedding pictures in _People_ ,” Jacob said. “She’s still gorgeous.”

“She is,” Alex agreed. “Smart, too. I wouldn’t be surprised to see her on a national ticket in another few years.”

“And this Church guy, he’s okay?”

“Yeah, he is. She took her time, you know, but they’re good together. It’s a good balance.”

Jacob was quiet for a couple of minutes. “It would never have worked with us long-term,” he said, “but I would have liked more time than we had.” His relationship with Angelica had lasted only a couple of months before he went to Headquarters to work with the General.

“You haven’t married again?”

Jacob shook his head. “There hasn’t been anybody serious for years. Besides, I like my job, and I’m good at it, and being married would complicate it way too much.” He smiled at Alex. “And Gil married Angelica and Eliza’s younger sister, right?”

“Yeah.” Alex gave him a condensed version of the love-at-first-sight story.

“Six kids? _Six?_ ”

“Plus Katie, who’s actually the baby sister, but Peggy and Gil raised her, so it’s really seven. Katie’s dating Danny’s son, by the way.”

Jacob’s jaw dropped. “Danny has a son old enough to date? _Danny?_ ”

Alex decided to skip the details. “Time flies. He and Martine have three kids.”

“Jesus, I’m old.”

“You said it, not me.”

Jacob looked at the clock on the wall. “We should head out. I’ve got my car here, so I’ll drive you.”

“Thanks,” Alex said. “Ben drove me here from the station. It’s a little early, though, isn’t it?”

“It will take some time to go through security at the White House.”

“Jacob, I work there.”

“Oh, right, I forgot. Well, I don’t, so they’ll have to clear me. And for God’s sake, stop calling me Jacob. Ben will have your head on a plate if he hears you.”

“Anything you say, Jago. I still think it’s a weird name, though.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We still don't know if Crazy Tony -- now President Wayne -- saw Eliza shoot Nick Mattice. We might find out when Alex meets with him in the next chapter.   
> We also don't know where Maria is at the moment, but Ben has made sure she's not going anywhere.  
> Thanks for reading this story and for leaving kudos and comments. I love hearing from you!


	8. I Remember That Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If I could rate each chapter separately, this one might get an E. Feel free to skip if anything makes you uncomfortable, of course, but the Explicit part of the chapter also reveals some things about John and Eliza's relationship, as well as about John's dark past.  
> Because a lot of things are happening at the same time, the chronology may be a bit odd in this chapter, but I don't think it's too hard to figure out.  
> As for the rest of the story, Ben questions the President and the First Lady, Gil and Peggy reminisce, and Alex worries about soybeans.

Eliza was drinking her tea and doing her best to pretend everything was normal, but Angelica knew better. There were purple shadows under her eyes, and she’d barely touched her lunch. Now, a few hours later, the two of them were alone in the library, and Eliza was talking about her kids as if this was just an ordinary conversation.

“It’s not just that Pip feels the need to correct his teachers if they make even the tiniest mistake,” she was saying, “but he gloats about it. We spent too much time talking to the principal last year, so we’re hoping things will go better now that he’s a year older.”

Privately, Angelica thought that Pip was likely to continue acting just like Alex, but she said, “Middle school is tough.”

Eliza nodded, looking at her tea. “Peggy says AJ was obnoxious in seventh grade, but that it was better by the time he started high school.”

Angelica tried to think of something to fill in the silence that fell, but her mind was blank, and after a few minutes, it was Eliza who spoke. “I know you want to know what’s happening, Ange, and I appreciate your not asking questions.”

“I wish I could make everything okay for you,” Angelica said, taking her sister’s hand.

Eliza held on tight. “Me too. At least Ben seems to know how to handle it.”

“I guess that’s his job.”

Eliza let go of her sister‘s hand to pick up her tea cup and take a sip from it. “Do you ever pray, Ange?” she asked almost randomly.

“I don’t know … maybe. Sometimes I just think things like _Please let everything be all right_ , as if somebody’s listening, but I don’t know if I believe it.”

Eliza nodded. “Yeah, me too. John prays.”

“Does he?”

“Yeah. He goes to church sometimes too, but he doesn’t ever make Alex or me feel like we’re not supporting him if we don’t go. It’s … odd, I guess, but you remember how he used to talk about praying to the angel?”

Angelica smiled faintly. “Yeah, John and Danny.”

“I think they’re both serious about it now. Danny and Patty go to church and all their kids have been baptized.”

Angelica considered that for a minute. “Danny was … fearless, from the time he was fifteen. He was as good with a gun as anybody except Gil.”

“I know, and I don’t think that’s changed. He’s some kind of secret agent now. It’s hard to see him that way, and it’s even harder to think of him as religious when I’m pretty sure he still carries a gun. John hasn’t picked up a gun since General Akhdir was elected. He was so glad to walk away from all of it.” John’s early art work had vividly expressed the pain and violence of the Insurrections. He didn’t need a gun to remind him.

“We were all glad to put it behind us,” Angelica reminded her.

Eliza looked up at her sister. “I just hope it really is behind us.” She put her tea cup down. “Anyway, I asked John and Danny both to pray that this all works out without anyone being hurt. I kind of feel like that’s cheating, since I don’t pray myself, but Danny said God wouldn’t mind.” Her lip trembled and she caught it between her teeth. “I wish I could talk to you about it, Ange, I really do.”

Angelica moved quickly to kneel in front of Eliza’s chair and put her arms around her sister. “I know,” she whispered. “I know.”

*          *          *          *          *

Jacob was the only one who hadn’t been in the Oval Office before, and he sat a little stiffly on one of the sage-green sofas that faced each other in front of the fireplace. Frank sat across from him, and Ben stood casually leaning on the mantel as Alex paced back and forth in front of the President’s desk.

“Sit down,” Ben said to Alex.

“I think better while I’m walking,” Alex told him, continuing to pace.

Ben looked like he wanted to say something else, but the President walked in, and they all stood to greet him.

“Sit down,” Tony Wayne said, waving in the direction of the sofas. He seated himself next to Frank Marion. Alex sat on the other sofa with Jacob, and Ben pulled up a small green and cream striped chair. Frank introduced Jacob as Jago Morgan, and the President shook his hand, looking at him closely.

“We’ve met before,” Tony said.

“Yes, sir.”

“You’re the fireman.”

Jacob grinned. “I was. Not anymore, though.”

The President looked at Ben. “Is he one of yours now?”

“Yes, sir. It’s probably better if you forget he was here.”

“I will,” Tony promised, and then turned to face Frank. “Give me the facts,” he directed.

Frank told him as concisely as possible about Maria Lewis’s blackmail threat. He paused, but the President didn’t say anything, so he added. “There was an incident involving Eliza Hamilton that we have concluded she might be referring to, but we haven’t been able to verify it.”

“Everyone here cleared?” the President asked.

“We’ve all got clearance but Jago hasn’t been read in on the incident because he was on the scene when it occurred, and I wanted to question him about his recollections of it.”

“And did that clarify anything?”

“No, sir, I’m afraid not.”

Tony nodded thoughtfully. “All right, read him in along with me so that we all know what we’re talking about.”

Frank hesitated. “Sir, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go at this backward. Part of what makes this blackmail threat worrisome is that you and the First Lady were also present when the incident occurred. Under the circumstances, I would advise that you allow yourselves to be questioned by Ben Tallmadge on the record before we give you any information.”

Tony looked from Frank to Ben and back again. “What the hell?” he asked.

Alex leaned forward, “Mr. President – Tony – we’re concerned about how this might affect you and your administration if Maria Lewis makes good on her threat.”

Tony gave him a faint smile. “Alex, you’ve known me from the beginning. You know I have nothing to hide.”

Frank leaned forward. “You may have seen something that you didn’t really pay attention to at the time, but that in retrospect could be a problem.”

Tony blew out an impatient breath. “How about you all stop talking in circles and just ask me whatever questions you need to as – no, wait a minute.” He rose, went to his desk and pushed a button. “Louisa, would you tell Iris that I need to speak with the First Lady in here as soon as possible? Tell her it’s important.”

Alex shot Ben a glance, but couldn’t read his face. “Maybe we should be off the record while we review,” he suggested.

Tony’s eyebrows went up. “I’m used to the cloak-and-dagger shit from Ben,” he said, “but you always tell me we’ve got nothing to hide.”

Alex looked miserable. “Maybe I’m wrong.”

There was a brief tap at the door, and the First Lady entered.

Molly Ludwig Hays Wayne had been part of the Movement from the beginning. With her first husband, Will, she had joined Tony’s squad in Philadelphia. Will had died in the First Insurrection, but Molly had never wavered, living with the rest of them in a cabin in the woods. For a while, she had dated Jack Sullivan, but that relationship had fallen apart near the end of the Second Insurrection. For the next few years, Molly worked in the Voting Rights Office, while Tony made a name for himself in the Senate. When she showed up to brief him on the Franchise Act, they went to get a drink, and from then on, they were together. The public ate up the romantic story, and their wedding at the National Cathedral had been the highlight of the summer sixteen years ago. They had three kids now, and Molly still worked to be sure that all eligible voters participated in their government. Registration and turnout had increased significantly, and Tony and Molly were both proud of it.

She stopped just inside the door now and looked around. “Hi, Frank. Hi, Alex. Hi, Ben.” She looked questioningly at Jacob, and he stood up.

“Jago Morgan, ma’am,” he said, his West Country accent evident.

Molly gave him a warm smile, then turned to Tony. “Iris said it was important.”

“Yeah. I’m not sure what we’re going to talk about, but Ben said you might have some information too. Somebody from twenty years ago has turned up and wants to blackmail Alex.” He shot Ben a look. “Ben says we could all be in trouble.”

Molly looked uneasy and moved closer to her husband. “Blackmail? Are you serious?”

“Apparently. Ben and Frank are still debating whether our conversation should be on or off the record.”

Frank stood up. “Sir, I feel strongly that Ben should interview each of you on the record before we have any other discussion. It’s important that we can all confirm your answers if necessary.”

“That bad, is it?” Tony asked drily. “Who do you want first, me or Molly?”

“It doesn’t …” Frank began, but Molly broke in.

“I’ll go first.”

Tony nodded. “I’ll be in the study.” He left and closed the door quietly behind him.

Molly pulled up another one of the striped chairs and sat down. “Fire away, Ben,” she said, trying to keep her voice light. Alex could see the tension around her eyes, though.

Ben took her through the same questions he had asked Jacob and got nearly identical answers. Molly had even less information, since she had been at the far end of the corridor while the firefight was going on and the prisoners were being cuffed. When they were done, she raised her hands from her lap and let them fall again. “I don’t think I’ve been much help.”

Ben did his best to sound reassuring. “It’s more a matter of consistency than of how much information you can give us.”

She nodded, then turned to Jacob. “I didn’t remember you at first, but you were there, weren’t you? Next to Herc Mulligan?”

Jacob looked at Ben, who said, “Go ahead.”

“I was,” Jacob told Molly, “but I’m surprised you remember me at all. We only saw each other for a few minutes, and there was a lot going on.”

“Your name wasn’t Jago, though,” Molly said. “I’d have remembered that.”

“Not then, it wasn’t.”

Molly looked at Ben. “Need to know?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, then, no questions.”

Frank went to the study and brought the President back in, and Ben began questioning him. Tony gave the same answers Jacob and Molly had given about the plan for the raid, the three-pronged attack, and who was where.

“Eliza was next to me most of the time,” he said. “We were at what would be the right-hand end of the corridor as we faced it from the entry point. That’s where the firefight started. Then once we had it contained, Herc and Jacob were to our left, and Molly and Jack to their left, farther down.”

“About how long was the corridor?”

Tony stopped and thought. “You have to understand that I’m guessing at this, but I’d say maybe thirty, thirty-five feet. It could have been longer, but I don’t think it was shorter than thirty.”

“When you say you had the firefight contained, what do you mean?”

“I mean we had all the Greaters incapacitated in one way or another – dead, wounded, or cuffed.”

“Were any of the wounded Greaters cuffed?”

“Well, of course. We cuffed anybody who could still move.”

“Were any of you still exchanging fire while men were being cuffed?”

“We had to have been.” Tony shifted impatiently in his chair. “It wasn’t all neat and tidy. Once the Greaters realized we had them flanked, some of them started surrendering. We were yelling at them to drop their weapons, but we were still shooting at the ones who weren’t, and Herc and Jacob were cuffing the ones who threw down their guns.”

“So some of the Greaters were surrendering, some were still shooting, and some were being cuffed all at the same time?”

“Yeah. You know, Ben, it might help if I had an idea what you were trying to figure out.”

“It probably would,” Ben agreed calmly, “but I’d have to give you too much information.”

“Fine,” Tony said, shrugging. A buzzer on his desk sounded, and he got up to respond. “Yes, Louisa?”

“You have the Secretary of Agriculture at three-thirty, sir.”

“We’re going to have to push that back …” he looked at Ben “… fifteen minutes?”

Ben nodded.

“Give the secretary my apologies and tell him it’s going to have to be three forty-five.”

“Yes, sir.”

Alex muttered something under his breath.

“What’s that, Alex?” the President asked, resuming his seat.

“The soybean situation, sir,” Alex said fretfully. “We’d just gotten that sorted out, and …”

“It’s fine,” Tony told him. “Fifteen minutes isn’t going to provoke a crisis.”

Alex nodded, but he began biting his lip.

Frank turned to the President. “If Ben needs more time with you, sir, maybe Alex could meet with the secretary.”

“Good idea,” Tony agreed, “but let’s try to move this along.”

*          *          *          *          *

Peggy had tried to sort out sleeping space for all the kids, but in the end, she gave up. They were all having so much fun together that they had already decided that they’d set up inflatable mattresses on the floor and put all the girls in Angie, Libby and Sky’s room and all the boys in AJ and Joey’s room. Back when she and Gil had bought the house, it had seemed enormous, and she had wondered what they would ever do with all the space. Now, though, with six kids plus Katie and Polly living there full time and frequent visits from their complicated extended family, she sometimes felt like a dozen bedrooms might be needed. Fortunately, the kids were all flexible about sharing their space, and she let them decide. If it crossed her mind that this arrangement left Katie and Polly’s room empty, she knew better than to mention it. Katie and Gabriel lived on different continents, and they still had to finish college. She didn’t begrudge them any time they could spend together. She’d spent almost every night with Gil since the day they met, and even when they’d been separated, it had only been for a night or two at a time. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to spend weeks or months without touching him.

She said that to him later, when they were in bed. “It must be so hard for them.”

“It is,” he agreed, twisting one of her curls around his finger. “It’s their decision, though.”

“I know.” She smiled and snuggled closer to him. “They’re really good kids, aren’t they?”

“All of them are – ours, Alex’s, Danny’s. I wasn’t sure how we would do it, you know.”

“What do you mean?”

 _“Chérie,_ only you and your sisters knew anything about how children should be raised. Alex and I were orphans, John’s parents were the worst possible examples, and Danny had practically brought himself up.”

“I’ll be happy to take credit,” she told him, “but you’re an amazing father. So are Alex and John and Danny. You and Alex understand what it’s like to grow up lonely, and John knows how devastating bad parenting can be, so it’s not like you were clueless.”

He laughed. _“Merci bien.”_

“Oh, you know what I mean. As for Danny, everybody always says he was exceptionally mature for his age, and he and Martine are good together.”

“They are indeed.” He was quiet for a minute, remembering. “Do you know how old Danny is?”

“He’s almost exactly your age, isn’t he? He’ll be forty in December.”

“That’s what it says on his passport,” Gil said. “Don’t forget, though, that John and I made his first passport. We had to … alter some facts.”

“What do you mean?”

“Chronically, he’ll be thirty-five in December, but he was handling adult responsibilities by the time he was fifteen.”

Peggy was doing the math in her head. “Thirty-five? That means he was … oh, my God, he was _sixteen_ when Gabriel was born?”

“John always said Danny was fifteen going on thirty. I wish you could have known him during the First Insurrection. In some ways he was older than any of us. I’m not astonished that he was an excellent father in his teens.”

“Even younger than I was when I fell in love with you,” Peggy mused.

“Yes, but like you, ready for it. You weren’t afraid, were you?”

“Of loving you? Never. It was the easiest thing I’d ever done.”

“I was right,” he said softly. “If we’re lucky enough to find love, we take it where we find it.”

“I know how lucky we are.”

*          *          *          *          *

Eliza had taken another shower, hoping the hot water would help her relax, but it hadn’t, and she stood staring out the window into the darkness. “I just want it to be over,” she said, her voice tight with anxiety.

John, across the room, watching her blurred reflection in the glass, could see the tension in the stiff line of her back. She took a quick breath, as if she were trying to hold off tears. “I wish I knew what they talked about with Tony today.”

“C’mere,” John said, his voice soft and coaxing, and he held out his arms. She turned and went straight to him, put her arms around his waist and leaned into his chest. He slid his hand into her hair and tilted her head up so he could look into her eyes. “We’ll know when we know, right? The past is past, and what happened happened, but we’ve got now, tonight, so let’s take that.”

She reached up to brush a curl off his forehead. “You’re so pretty.”

That made him smile. “Still?”

“Of course.” She kissed him softly. “John?”

“Hm?”

“I don’t want to think tonight.”

He saw the darkness in her eyes. “I’ll do everything I can to make it go away, babygirl.”

“Please.”

His hand twisted in her hair, and he pulled her head back, bent to get his teeth on the curve where her neck met her collarbone. He sank his teeth into her skin, biting hard, and she gasped and arched against him. He didn’t relent, sucking hard and twisting her hair tighter as her breathing quickened and she ground her hips on his. He finally felt a tiny relaxation in her body, and he took her robe off impatiently and tossed it on the floor. He ran his hands over her lightly, then picked her up and laid her on the bed. He straddled her, held her hands down at her sides, immobilized her hips between his knees, and looked at her. “My God, you’re gorgeous.”

He kissed her slowly, the way only John could kiss, his tongue sliding behind her bottom lip, then flicking the ticklish place on the roof of her mouth, his teeth nipping lightly. He traced the line of his teeth marks on her neck gently with his tongue, and he tasted blood. It wasn’t the first time, but it had been a while. Too long. “You’re bleeding,” he told her, not in apology.

“I know.”

“Did it hurt?”

“Yes.”

“Enough?”

“No.” Her breath was coming fast now.

It was risky territory. Eliza, scared and upset, wouldn’t be able to use her best judgment. As for himself – well, they’d all always known that if John ever unleashed everything that was inside him, somebody could be badly hurt. There was a safe word, of course, but tonight Eliza wanted to blot everything out of her consciousness, and he couldn’t be sure she’d use it. He rubbed against her, holding her in place, staring into her beautiful dark eyes. There was pain in them, the kind of pain he could make go away with a new and sharper pain, but there was also such absolute trust in him that his heart ached.

_This far and no farther._

He bent to put his mouth on her nipple, catching it between his teeth and holding it as he sucked on it. As he did, he let go of her hands and ran his right hand from her shoulder to her hip and back up again, caressing her belly and her other breast. He moved to the other side and repeated his actions, and she sighed. He did it again and again, and she put her arms around him, her hands in his hair, holding on tight. Her eyes began to look drowsy and unfocused, as if the fear in her mind was beginning to fade. He took two pillows from the head of the bed and shoved them under her, raising her hips. He pushed her legs back so that her feet were at her shoulders and she was almost upside-down, then put his hands on the inside of her thighs, gripping them hard, and spread her legs apart so that she was wide open to him. “Oh, fuck, darlin’,” he breathed, his mouth close to her. “That’s what I want.”

He took a taste, just a taste, running his tongue from back to front and flicking her clit before pulling back. He took a minute to throw his clothes on the floor and then put his hands back on her thighs right at the crease, so he could spread her even wider. He began working her with his thumbs, just playing, teasing, massaging lightly along the edges of her labia. She whimpered and her hips shuddered.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “That’s my girl.”

He brought his tongue back to her clit, and she pushed toward him. “Please.”

“Tell me.”

“John …”

“Yeah?”

“Everything.”

“This?” he asked, and pushed his tongue into her.

“Oh, _God.”_ She was trying to twist under him, but he still held her in place, bent backward so that she was inches from his mouth. It would only take a little more pressure for her to feel pain, pain that would make her cry out as her body jerked sharply. He tightened his grip on her thighs, digging his fingers in so that there would be purple bruises in the morning. Maybe that would be enough. She pulled in a long breath, and breathed, “Yes, more, yes.”

He brought his tongue back to her clit, circling it, but not giving her enough pressure. “This?”

“More,” she whimpered. “Harder.” She twisted her fingers, pulling his hair.

 _Fuck,_ that was good.

He let go of her thigh and slipped a finger into her. “Oh, sweetheart,” he said, “you’re so wet.” He circled his finger until it was good and wet, slid it along her slit to her ass. He got both hands on her ass then, holding it tightly as he went down on her again, wanting to leave a palm print on that beautiful white skin.

He could just fuck her now, fuck her hard enough to make her forget, and that would be enough.

“Hit me,” she said, pulling his hair so hard that he gasped.

“Eliza, babygirl, you’re upset, I don’t want …”

“Fuck you, John, don’t talk like Alex.”

And he laughed, right in the middle of it all, because nothing could have made it clearer to him that she was completely capable of making an independent decision.

He pushed his left thumb inside her, pressing up on the most sensitive spot, and with his right hand, he slapped her ass hard.

“Yeeesss,” she moaned, and his thumb was engulfed with warm liquid. She arched up, brought her legs forward and onto his shoulders, and he leaned against them, breathing fast.

He slapped her again and then again, the sharp crack of his hand on her making him rock hard.

“Fuck me,” she pleaded. “Fuckmefuckmefuckme …”

He couldn’t do anything else, and he entered her hard and fast, pushing her legs apart so that his body slammed against hers, and he felt the jolt all the way to his teeth. Yes. Again, and again, and again, and she was pulling his hair harder and harder until the exquisite fusion of pain and pleasure whited everything else out, and she buried her face in his neck, wailing.

*          *          *          *          *

“At that point in the firefight,” Ben said, returning to his questioning, “do you remember where Eliza Schuyler was?”

Tony frowned, rubbing his forehead. “Near me, I’m sure, because that’s how we’d gone in, but I couldn’t tell you how close. I have a vague recollection that she was to my right, but I couldn’t swear to it.”

“And she was armed and shooting just like everybody else?”

“Well, of course.” The President was losing patience. “We were breaking into a prison where political prisoners were being held. We wouldn’t exactly go in with flowers and candy.”

“Sorry,” Ben said, knowing he had only a few minutes before Tony demanded that they tell him exactly what they wanted to know about. “Do you recall there being any sort of … verbal altercation between Eliza and one of the Greaters?”

“Like what?”

“Any shouting, name-calling, anything like that?”

Tony stood up and began to pace. “For God’s sake, Ben, of course there was. Everybody was yelling. If you’re asking me to remember one particular incident or sentence that somebody might have said in the heat of battle twenty years ago, forget it. The Greaters were cursing at us, and we were cursing at them.” He waved his hand impatiently. “I can’t imagine how there could be blackmail about any of this. Is somebody saying that Eliza didn’t use proper vocabulary or something?”

“Not exactly, sir. One final question, though. Did you see or hear anything that might have violated the General’s protocols for personal conduct of Movement members?”

“No, of course not. Through two insurrections and all the time we were underground, I only saw that once, and it was long after the prison battle.”

Ben raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Charlie Lee,” the President said briefly. “You didn’t know him.”

It was correct that Ben had never met Charlie Lee, but he’d heard the story from Alex and knew that Charlie’s cowardice had almost cost John Laurens his life.

“So nothing out of order that night at the prison?”

“Nothing that I saw,” Tony reiterated.

Ben nodded. “That’s it then.”

Tony turned to glare at Frank Marion. “Are you going to tell me what the hell we’ve all been talking about?”

“Probably not, sir,” Frank responded politely, as calm as ever. “You don’t need to know.”

*          *          *          *          *

Eliza was soft and pliant in John’s arms, all of the tension washed out of her, at least for now. She was spooned against him, and he stroked her gently, loving her softness. His mouth was close to her ear and he told her how beautiful she was, how perfect.

She turned a little so she could kiss his jaw. “It was so good, John. So, so good. I needed it so much.”

“Me too, sweetheart. Sometimes …”

“What?”

“It builds up, you know? And then I’m afraid I might go too far.”

“I won’t let you. I know the safe word.”

He kissed her temple. “It feels so good to let go.” Not that he ever completely let go. He knew where the violence in him came from; his father had been a brutally violent man who had never held himself back. He’d beaten his son so many times that John had lost track; the last time was when he was sixteen. He had almost died. Only once had John succumbed to that dark impulse himself – once, instantly regretted and long ago atoned for. This, what he felt with Eliza, was different, controlled and purposeful. Eliza had once called it a riptide under the calm water, and that seemed accurate to him. He had come to accept that although this part of him came from his father, he was not his father. He would never be his father.

Eliza had helped him find himself and be whole. This was theirs alone. Alex knew all about it, of course, and sometimes he watched, but it made him uneasy if they went further than a little scratching and hair-pulling. It had been hard for him to understand how the edge of pain increased their arousal and made lovemaking that much more intense. When they made love with Alex, it was amazing, but different. If Eliza was tense or upset about something, Alex would comfort and reassure her; John would push her over a cliff into the waves. Both were wonderful, but tonight she had needed the most powerful experience she could find. She turned in John’s arms and kissed him. “I love you so much.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you see, Ben has no more information to work with than he did when he started. Is everybody really telling the truth about what they remember, or are they trying to protect Eliza -- and themselves? Where did Maria get her information? How will Alex handle the blackmail threat now?  
> Thanks to all of you for reading, and thanks for kudos and comments. Feel free to ask questions or make suggestions. I love hearing from readers.


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